Abstract
Soil conservation by vegetation can mitigate soil erosion hazard and prevent reductions in food productivity. However, previous research applies little consideration to the interaction between vegetation and climate change in the estimation of future soil conservation change. Therefore, based on the Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation (RUSLE), Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs, specifically RCP4.5 and RCP8.5), and the vegetation index and precipitation datasets, we built a multivariate regression equation that considers changes in vegetation growth under climate change scenarios in the context of soil conservation. Using the Nile River basin as a case study, via our established methods, we modelled and projected the impact of vegetation and climate change on future soil conservation between 2020 and 2100, where three main results were obtained: (1) under the scenarios of RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 from 2020 to 2100, soil conservation in the Nile Basin will first increase and then decrease, with its highest value in the years 2060, at 117.72 (t ha−1 y−1), and 2070, at 134.39 (t ha−1 y−1). (2) Soil conservation under RCP4.5 is lower than that under the RCP8.5 scenario, with a maximum difference of 27 (t ha−1 y−1) in 2040 and a minimum difference of 0.2 (t ha−1 y−1) in 2100. (3) The vegetation and climate change models in 2100 had soil conservation values of 110.77 (t ha−1 y−1) under RCP4.5 and 38.70 (t ha−1 y−1) under RCP8.5. In conclusion, although vegetation growth can increase soil conservation in the Nile River basin, the change in precipitation can offset the soil conservation enhanced by vegetation growth.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Anache J, Flanagan D, Srivastava A, et al. (2018) Land use and climate change impacts on runoff and soil erosion at the hillslope scale in the Brazilian Cercado. Sci Total Environ 622–623: 140–151. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2017.11.257
Angima S, Stott D, O’neill M, et al. (2003) Soil erosion prediction using RUSLE for central Kenyan highland conditions. Agr Ecosyst Environ 97(1): 295–308. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0167-8809(03)00011-2
Ausseil A, Dymond J, Kirschbaum M, et al. (2013) Assessment of multiple ecosystem services in New Zealand at the catchment scale. Environ Model Softw 43: 37–48. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envsoft.2013.01.006
Azarl M, Saghaflan B, Moradi H, et al. (2017) Effectiveness of soil and soil conservation practices under climate change in the Gorganroud Basin, Iran. Clean-soil Air Water 45(8). https://doi.org/10.1002/clen.201700288
Bai Y, Ouyang Z, Zheng H, et al. (2012) Modeling soil conservation, soil conservation and Their Tradeoffs: A case study in Bei**g. J Environ Sci 24(3): 419–426. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1001-0742(11)60790-0
Bangash R, Passuello A, Sanchez-Canales M, et al. (2013) Ecosystem services in Mediterranean river basin: climate change impact on soil provisioning and erosion control. Sci Total Environ 458–460: 246–255. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2013.04.025
Baude M, Meyer B, Schindewolf M (2019) Land use change in an agricultural landscape causing degradation of soil-based ecosystem services. Sci Total Environ 659: 1526–1536. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.12.455
Bhattacharjee P, Zaitchik B (2015) Perspectives on CMIP5 model performance in the Nile River headwaters regions. Int J Climatol 35: 4262–4275. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.4284
Borrelli P, Robinson D, Fleischer L, et al. (2013) An assessment of the global impact of 21st century land use change on soil erosion. Nat Commun 8: 1–13. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-017-02142-7
Broeckx J, Vanmaercke M, Duchateau R, et al. (2018) A data-based landslide susceptibility map of Africa. Earth-Sci Rev 185: 102–121.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.earscirev.2018.05.002
Bradford M, Wieder W, Bonan G, et al. (2016) Managing uncertainty in soil carbon feedbacks to climate change. Nat Clim Change 6(8): 751–758. https://doi.org/10.1038/NCLIMATE3071
Chu H, Venevsky S, Wu C, et al. (2008) NDVI-based vegetation dynamics and its response to climate changes at Amur-Heilongjiang River Basin from 1982 to 2015. Sci Total Environ 650: 2051–2062. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.09.115
Cohen M, Shepherd K, Walsh M (2005) Empirical reformulation of the Universal Soil Loss Equation for erosion risk assessment in a tropical watershed. Geoderma 124: 235–252. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoderma.2004.05.003
Cong N, Shen M, Yang W, et al. (2017) Varying responses of vegetation activity to climate changes on the Tibetan Plateau grassland. Int J Biometeorol 61: 1433–1444. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00484-017-1321-5
De Jong (1994) Derivation of vegetation variables from a Landsat TM image for modelling soil erosion. Earth Surf Proc Land 19: 165–178. https://doi.org/10.1002/esp.3290190207
Elsenbeer H, Cassel K, Tinner W (1993) A daily rainfall erosivity model for Western Amazonia. J Soil Water Conserv 48: 439–444. https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)0733-9437(1993)119:5(924)
Farr T, Rosen P, Caro E, et al. (2007) The shuttle radar topography mission. Rev Geophys 45(2): RG2004. https://doi.org/10.1029/2005RG000183.
Fenta A, Tsunekawa A, Haregeweyn N, et al. (2020) Land susceptibility to water and wind erosion risks in the east Africa region. Sci Total Environ 703: 135016. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.135016
Field C, Barros V (2014) Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability. Cambridge University Press, New York, NY.
Fix M, Cooley D, Sain S, et al. (2018) A comparison of US precipitation extremes under RCP8.5 and RCP4.5 with an application of pattern scaling. Clim Change 146: 335–347. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-016-1656-7
Fu B, Zhao W, Chen L, et al. (2005) Assessment of soil erosion at large watershed scale using RUSLE and GIS: a case study in the Loess Plateau of China. Land Degrad Develop 16: 73–85. https://doi.org/10.1002/ldr.646
Guay K, Beck P, Berner L, et al. (2014) Vegetation productivity patterns at high northern latitudes: a multi-sensor satellite data assessment. Global Change Biol 20(10): 3147–3158. https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.12647
Haregeweyn N, Tsunekawa A, Nyssen J, et al. (2015) Soil erosion and conservation in Ethiopia: a review. Prog Phys Geog 39: 750–774. https://doi.org/10.1177/0309133315598725
Haregeweyn N, Tsunekawa A, Poesen J, et al. (2017) Comprehensive assessment of soil erosion risk for better land use planning in river basins: Case study of the Upper Blue Nile River. Sci Total Environ 574: 95–108. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2016.09.019
Hengl T, de Jesus J, Mac Millan R, et al. (2014) Soil Grids 1km-global soil information based on automated map**. PLoS ONE 9(8): e105992. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0114788
Hou W, Gao J, Wu S, et al. (2005) Interannual variations in Growing-Season NDVI and Its correlation with climate variables in the Southwestern Karst region of China. Remote Sens 11106–11124. https://doi.org/10.3390/rs70911105
Hu M, Mao F, Sun H, et al. (2011) Study of normalized difference vegetation index variation and its correlation with climate factors in the three-river-source region. International J Appl Earth Obs 3: 24–33. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jag.2010.06.003
Jury M (2015) Statistical evaluation of CMIP5 climate change model simulations for the Ethiopian highlands. Int J Climatol 35: 37–44. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.3960
Kendall M (1975) Rank correlation methods. London: Charles Griffin.
Kong L, Zheng H, Rao E, et al. (2018) Evaluating indirect and direct effects of eco-restoration policy on soil conservation service in Yangtze River Basin. Sci Total Environ 631–632: 887–894. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.03.117
Kosaka Y, **e S (2013) Recent global-warming hiatus tied to equatorial Pacific surface cooling. Nature 501: 403–407. https://doi.org/10.1038/nature12534
Lemma H, Frankl A, Griensven A, et al. (2019) Identifying erosion hotspots in Lake Tana Basin from a multisite Soil and Water Assessment Tool validation: Opportunity for land managers. Land Degrad Develop 30: 1449–1467. https://doi.org/10.1002/ldr.3332
Lehner B, Grill G (2013) Global river hydrography and network routing: baseline data and new approaches to study the world’s large river systems. Hydrol Process 27(15): 2171–2186. Data is available at www.hydrosheds.org. https://doi.org/10.1002/hyp.9740
Liu B, Nearing M, Risses L (1994) Slope gradient effects on soil loss for steep slopes. Trans ASAE 37: 1835–1840. https://doi.org/10.13031/2013.28273
Liu Y, Fu B, Liu Y, et al. (2019) Vulnerability assessment of the global water erosion tendency: Vegetation greening can partly offset increasing rainfall stress. Land Degrad Develop 30: 1061–1069. https://doi.org/10.1002/ldr.3293
Liu Y, Zhao W, Liu Y, et al. (2020) Global rainfall erosivity changes between 1980 and 2017 based on an erosivity model using daily precipitation data. Catena 194: 104768. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.catena.2020.104768
McCool D, Brown L, Foster G, et al. (1987) Revised slope steepness factor for the Universal Soil Loss Equation. Trans ASAE 30: 1387–1396. https://doi.org/10.13031/2013.30576
Menz M, Dixon K, Hobbs R (2013) Hurdles and opportunities for landscape-scale restoration. Science 339: 526–527. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1228334
Mekonnen M, Keesstra S, Baartman J, et al. (2017) Reducing sediment connectivity through man-made and natural sediment sinks in the Minizr catchment, Northwest Ethiopia. Land Degrad Develop 28(2): 708–717. https://doi.org/10.1002/ldr.2629
Mekonnen D, Disse M (2018) Analyzing the future climate change of Upper Blue Nile River basin using statistical downscaling techniques. Hydrol Earth Syst Sc 22: 2391–2408. https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-2391-2018
Mishra K, Sinha R, Jain V, et al. (2019) Towards the assessment of sediment connectivity in a large Himalayan river basin. Sci Total Environ 666: 251–256. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.01.118
Mukwada G, Manatsa D (2018) Spatiotemporal analysis of the effect of climate change on vegetation health in the Drakensberg Mountain Region of South Africa. Environ Monit Assess 190: 358. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10661-018-6660-0
Ngetich K, Diels J, Shisanya C, et al. (2014). Effects of selected soil and water conservation techniques on runoff, sediment yield and maize productivity under sub-humid and semi-arid conditions in Kenya. Catena 121: 288–296. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.catena.2014.05.026
Nouri H, Anderson S, Sutton P, et al. (2017) NDVI, scale invariance and the modifiable areal unit problem: An assessment of vegetation in the Adelaide Parklands. Sci Total Environ 584–585: 11–18. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2017.01.130
Oldeman L, Hakkeling R, Sombroek W (1990) World map of the status of soil degradation, an explanatory note. International soil reference and information center, Wageningen, The Netherlands and the United Nations Environmental Program, Nairobi, Kenya.
Oleson K, Anderson G, Jones B, et al. (2018) Avoided climate impacts of urban and rural heat and cold waves over the US using large climate model ensembles for RCP4.5 and RCP8.5. Clim Change 146: 377–392. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-015-1504-1
Op de Hipt F, Diekkrüger B, Steup G, et al. (2017) Applying SHETRAN in a tropical West African catchment (Dano, Burkina Faso)—calibration, validation, uncertainty assessment. Water 9: 101. https://doi.org/10.3390/w9020101
Op de Hipt F, Diekkruger B, Steup G, et al. (2018) Modeling the impact of climate change on water resources and soil erosion in a tropical catchment in Burkina Faso, West Africa. Catena 163: 63–77. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.catena.2017.11.023
Op de Hipt F, Diekkruger B, Steup G, et al. (2019) Modeling the effect of land use and climate change on water resources and soil erosion in a tropical West Africa catchment (Dano, Burkina Faso) using SHETRAN. Sci Total Environ 653: 431–445. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.10.351
Panagos P, Borrelli P, Meusburger K, et al. (2015) Estimating the soil erosion cover-management factor at the European scale. Land Use Policy 48: 38–50. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landusepol.2015.05.021
Pham T, Yang D, Kanae S, et al. (2001) Application of RUSLE model on global soil erosion estimate. Annual Journal of Hydraulic Engineering 45: 811–816. https://doi.org/10.2208/prohe.45.811
Pinzon J, Tucker C (2014) A non-stationary 1981–2012 AVHRR NDVI3g time series. Remote Sens 6(8): 6929–6960. https://doi.org/10.3390/rs6086929
Piao S, Wang X, Wang K, et al. (2019) Interannual variation of terrestrial carbon cycle: Issues and perspectives. Global Change Biol 26(1): 300–318. https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.14884
Prager K, Helming K, Hagedorn K (2011) The challenge of develo** effective soil conservation policies. Land Degrad Develop 22: 1–4. https://doi.org/10.1002/ldr.1042
Rahman A, Muhammad D (2017) Spatio-statistical analysis of temperature fluctuation using Mann-Kendall and Sen’s slope approach. Clim Dynam 48: 783–797. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-016-3110-y
Rao E, Ouyang Z, Yu X, et al. (2014) Spatial patterns and impacts of soil conservation service in China. Geomorphology 207: 64–70. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geomorph.2013.10.027
Ramos M, Duran, B (2014) Assessment of rainfall erosivity and its spatial and temporal variabilities: Case study of the Penedes area (NE Spain). Catena 123: 135–147. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.catena.2014.07.015
Richard Y, Poccard I (1998) A statistical study of NDVI sensitivity to seasonal and interannual rainfall variations in Southern Africa. Int J Remote Sens 19: 2907–2920. https://doi.org/10.1080/014311698214343
Sansom P, Stephenson D, Ferro C, et al. (2013) Simple uncertainty frameworks for selecting weighting schemes and interpreting multimodel ensemble climate change experiments. J of Climat 26: 4017–4037. https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-12-00462.1
Sen P (1968) Estimates of the regression coefficient based on Kendall’s tau. J Am Stat Assoc 63(324): 1379–1389. https://doi.org/10.1080/01621459.1968.10480934
Silva R, Montenegro S, Santos C (2012) Integration of GIS and remote sensing for estimation of soil loss and prioritization of critical sub-catchments-a case study of Tapacura catchment. Nat Hazards 62: 953–970. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11069-012-0128-2
Tamene L, Le Q (2015) Estimating soil erosion in sub-Saharan Africa based on landscape similarity map** and using the revised universal soil loss equation (RUSLE). Nutr Cycl Agroecosyst 102: 17–31. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10705-015-9674-9
Teng H, Liang Z, Chen S, et al. (2018) Current and future assessments of soil erosion by water on the Tibetan Plateau based on RUSLE and CMIP5 climate models. Sci Total Environ 635: 673–686. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.04.146
Taye G, Poesen J, Wesemael B, et al. (2013) Effects of land use, slope gradient, and soil and soil conservation structures on runoff and soil loss in semi-arid Northern Ethiopia. Phys Geogr 34: 236–259. https://doi.org/10.1080/02723646.2013.832098
Van der Knijff J, Jones R Montanarella L (2000) Soil erosion risk assessment in Europe. Joint Research Centre, European Commission Brussels. EUR 19044 EN.
Wagena M, Sommerlo A, Abiy A, et al. (2016) Climate change in the Blue Nile Basin Ethiopia: implications for water resources and sediment transport. Clim Change 139: 229–243. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-016-1785-z
Wu X, Wei Y, Wang J, et al. (2018) RUSLE erodibility of heavy-textured soils as effected by soil type, erosional degradation, and rainfall intensity: A field simulation. Land Degrad Develop 29(3): 408–421. https://doi.org/10.1002/ldr.2864
Williams J (1990) The erosion-productivity impact calculator (EPIC) model: A case history. Philos T Roy Soc B 329(1255): 421–428. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.1990.0184
**ao Q, Hu D, **ao Y (2017) Assessing changes in soil conservation ecosystem services and casual factors in Three Gorges Reservoir region of China. J Clean Prod 163: S172–S180. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2016.09.012
**e Y, Yin S, Liu B, et al. (2016) Models for estimating daily rainfall erosivity in China. J Hydrol 535: 547–558. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2016.02.020
Xu H, Gao Q, Jiang Y (2008) Scenario analysis of soil erosion in the middle reaches of the Yellow River sandstone area in the watershed. J Ecol Rural Environ 1: 10–4. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1872-2075(08)60033-3
Yang D, Kanae S, Oki T, et al. (2003) Global potential soil erosion with reference to land use and climate changes. Hydrol Process 17(14): 2913–2928. https://doi.org/10.1002/hyp.1441
Zhao W, Liu Y, Daryanto S, et al. (2018) Metacoupling supply and demand for soil conservation service. Curr Opin Environ Sustainability 33: 136–141. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cosust.2018.05.011
Acknowledgement
This work was supported by the National Key Research and Development Program of China (No. 2017YFA0604704), the Strategic Priority Research Program of Chinese Academy of Sciences (XDA19030201), and Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities of China.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Electronic Supplementary Material
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Liu, H., Liu, Yx., Zhao, Ww. et al. Soil conservation assessment via climate change and vegetation growth scenarios in the Nile River basin. J. Mt. Sci. 18, 863–877 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11629-020-6304-z
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11629-020-6304-z