Spatio-temporal evolution analysis of the coupling situation of economic-social-ecological system in Guangdong

Abstract

The economic and social structures of Chinese cities are constantly transforming in recent years. The coordinated development of economic, social, and ecological environment is an important path to achieving the construction of high-quality development. Taking Guangdong Province, the largest economic province in China, as an example, the evaluation index systems of economic development system (ED), social development system (SD), and ecological environment system (EE) are constructed, respectively. The entropy weight method and comprehensive evaluation method are applied to measure the evaluation indexes of economic, social, and ecological environment levels of each city in Guangdong Province from 2010 to 2020. The coupled coordination model is used to measure the spatial and temporal evolution of the coupled ED-SD-EE coordination of Guangdong cities and explore the impact of the epidemic on the coupling coordination degree. The results concluded that (i) the economic, social, and ecological environment of each city in Guangdong Province will be more harmonious from 2010 to 2020. ED-SD-EE coupling coordination of Guangdong cities shows a “rising and then declining” trend, but it is still in a “high coupling-low coordination” development state. (ii) The lagging development of the coupled ED-SD-EE system in Guangdong cities is mainly the ecological environment system. (iii) Epidemic harms the coupling and coordination of Guangdong cities, with the most negative effect on the coordination development of the EE. The paper findings clarify the current state of ED-SD-EE coupling and coordination in Guangdong cities, with a view to providing a reference basis for policy formulation and research on quality urban development.

Measurement and Coupling Coordination of High-Quality Development in Guangdong Province of China: A Spatiotemporal Analysis

“…The ecological space is mainly distributed in hilly areas and mountains in Northern Guangdong, which is an important area for protecting and restoring key ecosystems in Guangdong [46]. Previous literature argued that the development of the economy is advancing in the direction of high ecological carrying capacity [47,48]. These findings are consistent with our analysis in that frequent human activities make ecosystem restoration more difficult.…”

Coordination divergence of the multi-systems in the Yangtze River Delta and its influencing factors from a coupled carbon reduction perspective

“…Xie used a coupled coordination model to reveal the interaction between land expansion and urbanization in built-up areas of Shanghai (Xie et al, 2021). Qiao analyzed the spatio-temporal linkages between economic, social and environmental systems in Guangdong Province (Qiao et al, 2023). Li assessed the current status of ecologically coherent development of resource-based cities in Northeast China through the degree of coordinated socio-economic and ecological development (Li et al, 2020).…”