Analysis of Net Primary Productivity Variation and Quantitative Assessment of Driving Forces—A Case Study of the Yangtze River Basin

Abstract

Net primary productivity (NPP) can indirectly reflect vegetation’s capacity for CO2 fixation, but its spatiotemporal dynamics are subject to alterations to some extent due to the influences of climate change and human activities. In this study, NPP is used as an indicator to investigate vegetarian carbon ability changes in the vital ecosystems of the Yangtze River Basin (YRB) in China. We also explored the NPP responses to climate change and human activities. We conducted a comprehensive analysis of the temporal dynamics and spatial variations in NPP within the YRB ecosystems from 2003 to 2020. Furthermore, we employed residual analysis to quantitatively assess the contributions of climate factors and human activities to NPP changes. The research findings are as follows: (1) Over the 18-year period, the average NPP within the basin amounted to 543.95 gC/m2, displaying a noticeable fluctuating upward trend with a growth rate of approximately 3.1 gC/m2; (2) The areas exhibiting an increasing trend in NPP account for 82.55% of the total study area. Regions with relatively high stability in the basin covered 62.36% of the total area, while areas with low stability accounted for 2.22%, mainly situated in the Hengduan Mountains of the western Sichuan Plateau; (3) NPP improvement was jointly driven by human activities and climate change, with human activities contributing more significantly to NPP growth. Specifically, the contributions were 65.39% in total, with human activities contributing 59.28% and climate change contributing 40.01%. This study provides an objective assessment of the contributions of human activities and climate change to vegetation productivity, offering crucial insights for future ecosystem development and environmental planning.