Jingyu Liu’s research while affiliated with Beijing Forestry University and other places

As a key industrial production base in China, Yellow River Belt regions are faced with immense pressure on their groundwater resources. Revealing the socio-hydrological dynamics of groundwater resources in the context of regional economic integration is essential for formulating sustainable water use. As an important aspect to reflect the socio-hydrological dynamics of regions along the Yellow River Belt, this study adopted a source-to-sink manner to quantitatively track regional groundwater use and the virtual groundwater transfer via domestic supply chains. The results indicated that the Yellow River Belt regions accounted for nearly a quarter of the national total groundwater use embedded in intraregional trades within China. It was found that regions along the Yellow River Belt primarily exported groundwater use to the Yangtze River Delta and South coastal region, with significant contributions coming from sectors such as chemical & mineral manufacturing, food & tobacco and agriculture. Water-deficient regions such as Inner Mongolia and Henan were revealed to supply substantial amounts of virtual groundwater use to other regions along the Yellow River Belt, exacerbating groundwater pressure in these areas that were scarce of water resources. These findings underline the importance of establishing intraregional and interregional cooperation mechanisms in coordinating water resources and economic development within the regions along the Yellow River Belt.

The livestock sector represents major challenges to safeguarding environmental integrity. This study comprehensively analyzes ten environmental footprints of the livestock sector from 1995 to 2022, with projections until 2030, and juxtaposes them with the planetary boundaries. We quantify greenhouse gas emissions, land use, water use, particulate matter formation, and biochemical flows associated with the livestock sector. Our findings indicate that the livestock sector alone poses a significant challenge to planetary boundaries and has the potential to threaten several of these boundaries by 2030. Scenario modeling shows that a “one-size-fits-all” strategy for all countries can be suboptimal. Conversely, a region-specific strategy that requires developed regions to align meat consumption with the Eat-Lancet diet while developing regions focus on improvement of production efficiency is optimal for reducing livestock's global environmental footprints. These findings highlight the need for targeted policy measures and regional strategies to effectively mitigate the environmental impacts of the livestock sector and ensure sustainable practices.

The livestock sector represents major challenges to safeguarding environmental integrity. Therefore, we comprehensively analyze twelve environmental impacts of the livestock sector from 1995 to 2016 and project them until 2030. Our findings show livestock production impacts land resources, freshwater use, energy demand, climate change, nitrogen and phosphorus flows, and atmospheric aerosol loading. The livestock sector alone will likely exceed the planetary boundary of GHG emissions by 2030 and pose threats to other boundaries. Continuation of the current patterns of livestock production will also preclude limiting global warming well below 2°C, as the Paris Agreement aims. The impacts from the livestock sector are unevenly distributed worldwide, with spillover effects from developed to developing regions. Livestock footprints, i.e., environmental impacts of the livestock sector, are concentrated in emerging economies of Asia & the Pacific and South America. In contrast, per-capita livestock footprints are highest in developed economies such as the US and the EU. The livestock sector represents targeted opportunities for climate change mitigation and global environmental change. Adopting a less meat-based diet can reduce livestock footprints.

The continuing urbanization and economic integration in the Yellow River regions have characterized a new form of arable land use that can be displaced as commodity embodiment through trade connections. To enunciate whether the Yellow River regions utilize their arable land resources to feed China, this work investigates the geographical displacement of arable land use for the Yellow River regions via trades. Empirical evidence reveals that the Yellow River regions contribute over a quarter of China’s total traded arable land use in both intermediate and final trades. The arable land displacement related to exports in the Yellow River regions is quantified to grow by 1.4 times during the period studied. Particularly, the arable land use displaced from the Yellow River regions to the Yangtze River Delta equals around one-tenth of the national total traded volume. On the sectoral level, agriculture and food & tobacco sectors altogether contribute around over 60% of the exports of the Yellow River regions. The outcome demonstrates that the Yellow River regions obtain arable land use from regions with lower economic levels and feed affluent areas with land-intensive commodities. Under the context of economic integration, this regional imbalance of arable land use may be further aggravated by frequent interregional trades and needs special attention to realize ecological protection and high-quality development in the Yellow River regions.