Quantitative analysis of the driving forces causing declines in marsh wetland landscapes in the Honghe region, northeast China, from 1975 to 2006

The Sanjiang Plain has the most representative and largest concentration of inland freshwater wetlands in China, most of which have been degraded or have disappeared as a result of agricultural development and climatic change since the 1950s. To better understand the spatial and temporal variation and driving forces of marsh reduction, this study investigated variations of marsh reduction in the Honghe region of the Sanjiang Plain, Northeast China over a 30-year period, and analyzed the role of the different driving forces separately and their combined effect on marsh reduction and identified what driving forces have played key roles on the reduction in different periods. Nine natural and anthropogenic variables from remote sensing, GIS data and field surveys, such as precipitation, temperature, precipitation anomaly, population density, agricultural population density, per capita GDP, distance to road, distance to canal and distance to settlement, were evaluated on their impact on observed variations of marsh reduction between 1975 and 2006. The results show that all of these driving forces have significant influences on the decline of the marsh area, and the combination of driving forces that has crucial impacts on marsh reduction varied largely from 1975 to 2006. During 1975–1989, it was the construction of canal and road networks in farms and changes in average annual precipitation that led to marsh reduction. After 1989, the reduction was mainly related to increases in agricultural population, per capita GDP and settlements. These findings may help understand the declines or degradation of marsh areas and provide an empirical and theoretical base for managers, who design and implement wetland management and planning.