An indicator system for effectiveness evaluation of ecological corridor restoration based on landscape patterns and ecosystem services

Implementing territorial ecological protection and restoration projects is important for promoting the China’s ecological civilization construction and ensuring national ecological security. China has actively explored and coordinated the integrated protection and restoration of mountains, rivers, forests, farmlands, lakes, and grasslands, and several important ecological protection and restoration projects at both the national and local levels since 2012. As an important component of territorial ecological protection and restoration, ecological corridors, which are zonal areas in the ecological environment, can effectively form regional-scale ecological networks to ensure regional ecological security. After the completion of projects, it is of great practical importance to evaluate the effectiveness of implementation of ecological restoration projects and analyze changes in ecological conditions before and after construction to improve ecological restoration work and optimize ecological safety barrier systems. However, there are several problems with the existing effectiveness evaluation of ecological corridor construction, such as a single evaluation objective, an incomplete evaluation indicator system, lack of principles of landscape ecology, and lack of evaluation of ecological restoration projects at different scales. Therefore, there is an urgent need to establish a systematic and comprehensive indicator system to evaluate the effectiveness of ecological corridor restoration. This study integrated ecosystem services indicators and proposed an indicator system for comprehensive effectiveness evaluation of ecological corridor restoration based on Pattern-Quality-Service. According to the characteristics of the ecological corridor, the effectiveness evaluation involved four dimensions: landscape patterns, biodiversity, habitat, and ecosystem services. These important evaluation points were determined at the project and ecological protection and restoration unit scales. By means of frequency analysis, expert consultation, and other methods, taking the improvement of ecosystem services as the restoration goal and referring to the existing specifications, the specific indicators that could objectively reflect the ecological restoration benefits of the project were screened. A comprehensive indicator system with clear quantitative methods and evaluation criteria was developed. The evaluation indicator system included four project layers, namely landscape pattern optimization, biodiversity conservation, habitat conservation and construction, and ecosystem service improvement, as well as 15 criteria layers and 41 indicators. Considering the integrated protection and restoration of various ecological elements in different regions, the evaluation indicators were divided into restrictive and recommended indicators, which were applied to common integral and individual optional conditions in the projects, respectively. Classifying these two indicators can enhance the flexibility of the evaluation indicator system and expand its applicability. In practice, the selection of evaluation indicators for the effectiveness of ecological restoration projects should be combined with the actual situation of the project based on this indicator system and common indicators should be selected for evaluation. Based on the evaluation results, ecological protection, and restoration work can be adjusted and corrected. In general, this study can better realize the ecological benefits of ecological corridors restoration and promote the construction practice of such ecological corridors. It could also provide a scientific reference and theoretical support for the planning, construction, implementation, and followup management of future territorial ecological restoration.