5.Conclusion
The urbanization index and four
subsystems revealed an upward trend at the national scale, with
significant growth in major urban agglomerations (i.e., BTH, YRD, PRD)
and provincial capitals. At the regional scale, areas with higher
urbanization index mainly concentrated in east, central and north, while
the northwest and southeast presented lower urbanization levels.
Ecosystem vigor and EHI increased from 2000 to 2020, while the ecosystem
organization and resilience revealed a negative growth. Moreover, the
region east of the Hu Line demonstrated higher ecosystem health, vigor
and resilience, while regional ecosystem organization values were higher
in the west. In addition, the bivariate spatial autocorrelation results
indicated that UI and EHI were
negatively correlated.
Terrestrial ecosystem health was influenced by the negative
externalities of spatial spillover effects of urbanization in
neighboring regions. According to the PLS-SEM modeling results,
anthropogenic drivers (i.e.,
social and economic factors) were the main factors that promoted
urbanization and damaged terrestrial ecosystem health. Natural factors
(i.e., climate and topography factors) contributed to terrestrial
ecosystem health and climate displayed negative effects on urbanization.
Additionally, urbanization promoted terrestrial ecosystem health at the
national scale, enhanced by social, economic and topographical factors.
All regions, apart from the southwest, exhibited positive path
coefficients of UI on EHI. Our results indicated that the positive
effect of urbanization on terrestrial ecosystem health has appeared. For
the harmonious and sustainable development of urbanization and
terrestrial ecosystem health, the government should accelerate regional
integration, replace resource consumption with technological innovation,
and strengthen ecological protection and restoration.