Assessment Of Tourism And Recreation Cultural Ecosystem Services In Three Parallel Rivers Region

Ecosystem services play a crucial role in bridging the relationship between nature and human well-being.The sustainable development of human society greatly depends on the continuous supply of various ecosystem services.Ecosystems not only provide the environmental conditions and material resources for human survival,but also bring cultural enjoyment such as leisure and entertainment.Ecosystem services are often classified into four categories,i.e.,provisioning services,regulating services,supporting services and cultural services.Considering the crucial role of ecosystem services for human,especially the current sharp degradation of natural ecosystems is seriously threatening human well-being,the assessment of ecosystem services has recently become one of the research frontiers in geography and ecology.However,quantitative assessment of cultural ecosystem services is facing a great challenge due to their immateriality and subjectivity.Compared with the services of educational knowledge and religious spirit,etc.,tourism and recreation have a clear definition and division,which are generally regarded as the most direct approach in the assessment of cultural ecosystem services.Moreover,with the rapid society development,human has a much higher requirement on spiritual life,and thus tourism and recreation have become an indispensable part of people’s life.With its abundant ecological landscape,diverse species and unique cultural resources,Three Parallel Rivers Region(TRRR)is characterized by its unique tourism and recreation resources.How to efficiently manage and develop these resources has become a crucial issue.Therefore,it has a great onthe-ground significance to quantitatively assess its tourism and recreation resources,which can guide the policies on ecological tourism,ecological civilization construction and sustainable development.Meanwhile,the study conducted in this global biodiversity and culture hotspot ensures to provide a typical case on the research of tourism and recreation cultural ecosystem services,and to enrich the existing methods.With TRRR as the study area,according to existing research methods and the conditions in TPRR,this study used six indicators including landscape diversity,naturalness,rivers and lakes visibility,scenic spots levels,accessibility and serving infrastructures.By applying the spatial analyzing models in Arc GIS,this study first quantitatively assessed the tourism/recreation potential and opportunity for both the existing and potential tourism/recreation ecosystem services.Then the amount for both existing and potential tourism/recreation ecosystem services were modeled and classified into five different levels.The spatial patterns of the six indicators and the potential,opportunity and amount for both existing and potential tourism/recreation ecosystem services were systematically analyzed.Finally,by implementing the coldhot-spot analysis,the study clarified the spatial distribution patterns of both existing and potential tourism/recreation cultural ecosystem services in TRRR,recommended some relevant advices on improving the tourism/recreation managements and developments.The main results and conclusions of this study are as follows:(1)The spatial distributions of the six indexes had their own distribution characteristics on both horizontal and elevational directions,but to some extent,they were similar.There were similar distributions characteristics about scenic spots levels,accessibility and servicing infrastructures.High levels of them just distributed in the eastern of study area,and had a distribution pattern of Dali prefecture > Lijiang city > Diqing prefecture > Nujiang prefecture in the administrative unit,and high levels in areas with lower elevations were more.The difference of landscape diversity levels was not significant,the landscape types of Nujiang prefecture was abundant,and the high elevational areas had more landscape types.The high levels of naturalness were mainly distributed in the western region,which were prominent in the high mountain areas of Nujiang and Diqing Prefectures,while the naturalness of Dali prefecture and Lijiang city was low levels,and the areas with high elevations had higher levels.The high levels of rivers and lakes visibility had a distribution pattern of Dali prefecture > Nujiang prefecture >Lijiang city > Diqing prefecture,and more high levels distributed in low elevational area than high.(2)For the existing tourism/recreation cultural ecosystem services,the high levels of potential,opportunity and service amount were all had a distribution pattern of Dali prefecture > Lijiang city > Diqing prefecture >Nujiang prefecture,and they were higher in areas with lower elevations.For the potential tourism/recreation cultural ecosystem services,the spatial distributions of potential and opportunity were obviously different.The areas with high tourism/recreation potential were mainly distributed in Dali prefecture,Lijiang city,the great mountain-gorge areas in Nujiang prefecture and Deqin county,and the areas with high elevations.The areas with high tourism/recreation opportunity were mainly distributed in eastern regions,and the areas with low elevations had high opportunity levels,whereas Nujiang prefecture was in lower levels.About 17.64% of the study area had high levels of tourism/recreation service amount,which were concentrated in Dali prefecture,Lijiang city,and some areas of Shangri-La.(3)There were obvious mismatches between the tourism/recreation potential and opportunity in some regions,thus the maximum service amount were not practically realized.The overlapping number between the high levels of tourism/recreation potential townships and opportunity townships reached to 45.76%,and they mainly concentrated in Dali and Lijiang regions.Nujiang and other remote areas although had rich tourism/recreation resources,their tourism/recreation opportunity and service amount were very low.The development of the existing tourism/recreation resources in TRRR matched well with the natural conditions to some degree.Most of the scenic spots with high tourism/recreation service amount were in Dali,Lijiang,Shangri-La and Deqin,and these areas also had high levels of potential and amount for the potential tourism/recreation cultural ecosystem services.(4)The ecological conception about sustainable development should be set up in the tourism/recreation cultural ecosystem development in TRRR,increase the investment to the high potential but low opportunity areas under the premise of protecting the local ecological environment,and control the number of visitors to high potential and opportunity areas.Meanwhile,develop the rational tourism/recreation modes.In areas with high potential service amount but low existing service amount,ecological and rural tourism/recreation are the main modes,e.g.,Nujiang prefecture and Deqin county.Develop cultural tourism/recreation mode in areas with high potential and existing services amount,e.g.,Dali prefecture and Lijiang city.For ecology-cultural tourism/recreation mode,it can guarantee the dual advantages of environment and characteristics,thus can be widely applied to most regions.