Study On The Coupling Coordination Among Water Resources,Economic Society,and Environmental Protection In The Upper Reaches Of The Yellow River

The Yellow River has nourished the Chinese civilization for five thousand years,and protecting the Yellow River is a great plan for the great rejuvenation and sustainable development of the Chinese nation.With the development of ecological protection and high-quality of the Yellow River Basin as a major national strategy,promoting the comprehensive,coordinated and sustainable development of the Yellow River Basin has become a top priority.The upper reaches of the Yellow River,an important economic development and ecological function area in China,play an extremely important role in the ecological protection and high-quality development layout of the Yellow River Basin.However,problems such as shortage of water resources,lagging level of economic and social development,and fragile ecological environment have restricted the development of the upper reaches of the Yellow River.And with the rapid economic and social development in the upper reaches of the Yellow River,the consumption of water resources continues to increase,and the destruction of the ecological environment is becoming more and more serious,the issue of uncoordinated and unsustainable development is gradually becoming prominent.Therefore,it is of great significance for the high-quality development of cities to explore the coupling and coordinated development level and evolution law of water resources,economic society,and environmental protection in the upper reaches of the Yellow River.This study takes 2011 to 2020 as the research period,18 cities in the upper reaches of the Yellow River as the research area,and high-quality development theory and sustainable development theory as the main reference.First,the three-stage DEA model was used to measure the water resources utilization efficiency,and the Malmquist productivity index was applied to study the dynamic changes of water resources utilization efficiency.Second,the comprehensive development level was calculated by constructing the index system of water resources,economic society and environmental protection based on the TOPSIS-grey correlation analysis model.Finally,the coupling coordination degree model was used to calculate the coupling coordination development level,and the spatial correlation of the coupling coordination degree was analyzed by the spatial econometric model,predicting the future development trend of the coupling coordination degree.The main conclusions of this study are as follows:(1)From 2011 to 2020,the water resource utilization efficiency of cities in the upper reaches of the Yellow River showed an overall upward trend,with varying degrees of improvement in technical efficiency,pure technical efficiency,and scale efficiency.From the dynamic changes in water resource utilization efficiency,the improvement of the total factor productivity change index mainly depends on the improvement of the index of technological progress.(2)The comprehensive development level of water resources,economy,society,and environmental protection system shows a steady upward trend,with the comprehensive score increasing from 0.405 in 2011 to 0.466 in 2020.The comprehensive development level of the three subsystems has also improved to varying degrees,with the comprehensive score of the water resources subsystem increasing from 0.447 to 0.473,the comprehensive score of the economic and social subsystem increasing from 0.305 to 0.358,and the comprehensive score of the environmental protection subsystem increasing from 0.462 to 0.568.(3)From 2011 to 2020,the coupling coordination degree of water resources,economic society and environmental protection system showed an overall upward trend,increasing from 0.332 in 2011 to 0.506 in 2020.The development type of coupling coordination degree has shifted from the primary imbalance economic and social lag type to the barely coordinated economic and social lag type.(4)Based on the global spatial correlation of the coupling coordination degree,the coupling coordination degree of water resources,economic society and environmental protection system in the upper reaches of the Yellow River presents a significant spatial positive correlation,with obvious the agglomeration characteristics and the inter-regional agglomeration patterns.From the local spatial correlation of the coupling coordination degree,the cities located in the HH quadrant did not increase significantly,nor did the cities located in the LL quadrant significantly decrease.The spatial positive correlation of the coupling coordination degree continues to weaken,and the spatial heterogeneity continues to increase.(5)According to the predicted results of the gray GM(1,1)model,the changing trend of the coupling coordination degree of water resources,economic society and environmental protection system in the next five years roughly continues the historical trend of 2011-2020,showing a slight upward trend,and the coupling coordination degree type evolves into the primary coordination economic and social lagging type.