Abstract:
Land use change is one of the direct drivers of biodiversity loss. Modeling land use patterns and biodiversity change in the future through the development of scenarios can guide the formulation of biodiversity conservation targets and policies and become a powerful tool for decision-making. In this study, we took the terrestrial area of Zhejiang Province as the study area. Based on the three action-oriented targets of spatial planning, restoration of degraded ecosystems, and protected areas in the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, we set biodiversity conservation targets and policies for Zhejiang and formulated three scenarios of the Baseline Scenario, the Beautiful Zhejiang Scenario, and the Intelligent Zhejiang Scenario. Among these scenarios, the Baseline Scenario emphasized natural changes following current development trends, the Beautiful Zhejiang Scenario emphasized the conservation of the originality and integrity of natural ecosystems, and the Intelligent Zhejiang Scenario emphasized the enhancement of nature′s beneficial contributions to human beings′ quality of life through the high technologies. The FLUS-Biodiversity model was utilized to simulate the distribution and changes of the land use pattern and Mean Species Abundance (MSA) in Zhejiang Province in 2035 and 2050. This study achieved an organic integration of targets, policies, and scenario simulations. The results showed that: (1) The MSA index in Zhejiang Province was 0.547 in 2020, and the growth of urban construction land exceeded the urban development boundary in the Baseline Scenario, occupying the ecological preservation zones and farmlands and causing the decline of biodiversity, and the MSA index decreased to 0.535 in 2050. However, this trend is reversed in the Beautiful Zhejiang Scenario and Intelligent Zhejiang Scenario, with the MSA index increasing to 0.624 and 0.573 in 2050, respectively, as well as improved biodiversity. (2) Under the Beautiful Zhejiang Scenario, the ecological red line area accounts for 27.14% in 2035, and the newly added areas that are mainly distributed in the outer edge of the current ecological red line effectively protect biodiversity. (3) Under the Beautiful Zhejiang Scenario and Intelligent Zhejiang Scenario, lower levels of disturbance occur in moderately and highly disturbed forests and wetlands, as well as disturbed grasslands, leading to the increase of biodiversity. The study shows that biodiversity can be effectively increased, and its conservation targets can be achieved by balancing land use change with biodiversity conservation, implementing conservation policies and measures, and enhancing governance capacities and levels.