Evolution of an Estuarine Island in the Anthropocene: Complex Dynamics of Chongming Island, Shanghai, P.R. China

Abstract

Islands are known to be vulnerable to many natural and anthropogenic hazards, especially estuarine islands, which are affected at rates and intensities above those found elsewhere around the globe. The sustainable development of estuarine islands has been a part of their evolution, which has been a continuous integration of human impact and response to natural processes. This study reviews the complex dynamics of Chongming Island, an estuarine island in Shanghai, with an emphasis on the nature of human intervention. We conclude that the island is an example of a coupled human-environment system, as it has been throughout its formation and evolution, which is integrated at the local (intracoupled), regional (pericoupled), and global (telecoupled) scale. This conceptual framework reveals Chongming Island to be an exemplar of—and indeed a test-case for—China’s vision of eco-civilization development, in which it is reimagined as an ‘eco-island’. Accordingly, we argue that islands are benchmarks for building sustainability in the Anthropocene, and a more complete understanding of their dynamics, and the factors that influence them in a metacoupled world, is critical for future development.

Disappearing reeds on Chongming Island: An environmental microhistory of Chinese eco-development

“…With an area of 1267 km 2 , it is the largest alluvial island in the world. The island is flat and characterised by low elevation because 90% of its area lies between 3.47 and 5.07 m annual mean sea level (mean 4.12 m) (Wu et al., 2019). As mentioned above, Chongming is one of China’s pioneering eco-development sites endowed with high level political patronage.…”

“…From the eighth to the fourteenth century, sandbanks continued to emerge, growing as a result of natural processes of sediment deposition by the Yangtze River. They were scattered and unstable in their size and location (Wu et al, 2019), and for a long time, soil on these sandbanks was salty and not arable. Yet it was suitable for growing reeds and producing salt.…”

“…Inside the levees, people grew reeds to consolidate the soil and channel the river water into the hinterlands to develop agriculture. However, due to their small scale and insufficient protection, such sand islands often collapsed during typhoons and storm surges (Wu et al., 2019). From 1917 to 1948, there were 17 land reclamation projects recorded on Chongming, with a total of 6000 mu (4 km 2 ) of land reclaimed (Chongming County Water Affairs Bureau, 1987).…”

“…3.47 and 5.07 m annual mean sea level (mean 4.12 m)(Wu et al, 2019). As mentioned above, Chongming is one of China's pioneering eco-development sites endowed with high level political patronage.…”

Piloting a capital-based approach for characterizing and evaluating drivers of island sustainability- An application in Chongming Island

“…In the meantime, climate change has induced uncertainty in estimating the parameters and produced a tremendous impact on the physical and chemical ecosystems for small islands and Small Island Development States (Duvat et al, 2017;Ourbak and Magnan, 2018;Petzold and Magnan, 2019). With new stakes of the Anthropocene in islands context, the anthropogenic factors should not be ignored in island sustainability studies (Chandler and Pugh, 2018;Pugh, 2018;Wu et al, 2019).…”