Integrating ecosystem service value in the disclosure of landscape ecological risk changes: a case study in Yangtze River Economic Belt, China

Urban expansion and inappropriate land uses have caused a decline in the regional ecosystem services capacity, which is contrary to United Nations' Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 15 aiming to protect and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems. Landscape ecological risk (LER) visually depicts the disturbances to ecosystem services and environmental shifts resulting from human activities. Consideration of ecosystem services in LER assessment has not been sufficiently researched. Here, we employed ecosystem service values (ESV) to define landscape vulnerability, and adopted an enhanced risk assessment framework, amalgamating landscape patterns and ecosystem processes, to evaluate the spatial-temporal shifts in ESV and LER in the Yangtze River Economic Belt (YREB) from 2000 to 2020. We attempted to analyze the relationship between LER and anthropogenic disturbances. The results showed that over the past 20 years, the general trend revealed a diminishing high-risk area, while medium and low-risk regions expanded. Notably, the urban agglomeration of the YREB experienced a marked surge in risk. Regarding migration direction, the low-risk category has expanded in the east–west direction, while the medium and high-risk categories have shown inward contraction mainly in the north–south direction. The findings highlight the complex changes between ecological processes and LER under anthropogenic disturbances, and can serve as a guide for sustainable risk management and the development of ecological security patterns.