The ecological environment and resource endowment of an island are more vulnerable compared to the mainland, and special assessment and measurement of the ecological suitability for development are significant. Pingtan Island (Fujian, China) was taken as a case study. Changes in ecosystem services value and the profit-and-loss balance between ecological footprint and biocapacity were assessed using land use/cover changes based on remote-sensing images taken in 2009, 2014 and 2017, and the ecological suitability of development was measured. Results show that island development led to a decrease in the ecosystem services value and an increase in ecological footprint and biocapacity. The key ecological factors restricting the scale of island development are topography, vegetation with special functions and freshwater. Biocapacity of islands can increase not only by changing from lower-yield land types to higher-yield construction land types but also by external investment. A new measurement framework was proposed that simply and clearly reveals the ecological suitability of island development and the underlying key constraints.

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