Ecological suitability assessment is an effective approach to identify and locate the most suitable territories for future development in order to reduce the negative impacts of human activities on the ecosystem for ensuring sustainable development. The study aimed to propose a future direction for sustainable use of natural resources at the district level in Bac Kan province based on the ecological suitability evaluation approach and the trade-off technique. This study firstly applied the Delphi method to identify significant ecological resistance indicators for assessing ecological elements, importance, and resilience, which characterize the resistance of ecological structures, ecological functions, and ecological dynamics to construction and development, respectively. Then, an integrated ecological resistance model was applied to classify ecological suitability for construction and development. Moreover, spatial analysis and trade-off technique were applied to assign a development zone and propose future directions at provincial and district levels in Bac Kan province. The results revealed that the most dominant ecological suitability class for construction and development is the moderately suitable class, and it accounts for about 1948 km2 or 40.30% of the total area. In addition, five development zones were assigned at the provincial level, whereas three future directions for sustainable use of natural resources were proposed at the district level. In a nutshell, the research methodology framework in this study can be used as a guideline to land managers and planners for ecological suitability assessment in Vietnam.

Landscape theory and its application have played an important role in natural resource exploitation and environmental protection. Various classification approaches had been employed worldwide in landscape ecology studies. This paper had developed a new hierarchical landscape classification framework for quantifying spatial pattern of Bac Kan province. A landscape formation equation was applied with three natural factors (geology, topography, and soil) and cultural factor (land use). A multi-level segmentation technique with multiresolution segmentation algorithm was chosen to segment landscape units (patches) and to categorize landscape types at different levels. The results revealed that the landscape classification of Bac Kan province has 4 hierarchical levels. Level 4, which provided full details of spatial pattern based on geologic period, elevation, soil depth, and land use, had 315 landscape types. At this level, there are 8,427 landscape units mapped with a minimum and maximum areas of 0.02 km 2 and 116.63 km 2 , respectively. A new Bac Kan landscape map at a scale of 1:100,000 along with 16 different attributes for each landscape unit was also produced. In conclusion, the framework of research methodology presented in this paper can be used as a guideline for landscape classification at provincial and national levels.

Assessment of ecosystem services is vital for successful natural resource allocation; however, these have been less studied within Vietnam. This study estimated the ecosystem services value (ESV) and its change in Cham Chu nature reserve, Vietnam using a benefit transfer method. Ecosystem service values estimation and trend analyses were carried out based on land use and land cover datasets from 1986, 1998, 2007, and 2017, with their corresponding global value coefficients. The results revealed that the total value of ecosystem services in Cham Chu was approximately 64.4, 63.9, 60.7, and 63.4 million USD in 1986, 1998, 2007, and 2017, respectively. Changes have also occurred in the values of individual ecosystem service functions. From 1986 to 2017, ecosystem service functions showed significant decreases in gas regulation, pollination, biological control, water regulation, water supply, and food production of 62.9%, 51.2%, 44.4%, 24.7%, 23.1%, and 13.0%, respectively. We conclude that the loss of ESV is a result of ecological deterioration in the studied landscape, and we propose further research to examine future solutions and establish action strategies. In summary, the research approach methodology developed can be used by land managers and planners in Vietnam as a guideline to estimate the importance of ecosystem services in Vietnam.