Ecological and Environmental Risk Warning Framework of Land Use/Cover Change for the Belt and Road Initiative

Abstract

Land use/cover change(LUCC) has a significant impact on the ecological environment. Within the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), as the largest cross-spatial cooperation initiative in human history, one of the core issues is how to scientifically and effectively use and manage the land in the region to prevent the destruction of important ecological and environmental resources. In order to reduce impact on the latter, in this study, we used the bivariate choropleth–multiple-criteria decision analysis (BC-MCDA) method based on the connotation of the sustainable development goals to construct an ecological and environmental risk warning framework. We found that in the study area, 10.51% of the land has high ecological and environmental risk and importance, corresponding to conflict zones, which require special attention. Conflict areas are mainly distributed in the Gangetic Plain in India, the plains in central and southern Cambodia, the Indonesian archipelago, and the southern coastal areas of China. Due to the uneven spatial distributions of population and important ecological and environmental resources, the pressure on this type of land use is very high. A share of 8.06% of the land has high risk–low importance, corresponding to economic development zones. Following years of human development, the ecological and environmental value of this type of land is low. A share of 58.75% of the land has low risk and importance, corresponding to wilderness areas. The natural climatic conditions of this type of land are relatively poor, often characterized by a cold climate or water scarcity, and the human interference index is low. A share of 22.68% of the land has low risk–high importance, corresponding to ecological conservation areas, which are the most important areas for ecological function services for humans at present. Finally, we proposed development suggestions for each type of land.

1. Introduction

Land is an indispensable means of production for human beings and a spatial carrier for the coexistence of human beings and ecosystems. In the long run, changes in land use/cover are accompanied by ecological and environmental risks. In order to meet their own production and living needs, human beings have reduced and fragmented the original ecological space through deforestation, farmland reclamation, and urbanization, resulting in a series of problems, such as the degradation of ecological and environmental system regulation and service functions. Against the backdrop of global change, as the largest cross-spatial cooperation initiative in human history, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) spans the Eurasian and African continents, passing through a vast area with complex and diverse natural environments. However, most regions are relatively economically underdeveloped and lack awareness of ecological and environmental protection. Rapid agricultural expansion, industrialization, and urbanization have caused a series of ecological and environmental problems, significantly affecting regional sustainable development. In the face of ecological and environmental risk challenges brought about by future land use/cover change, it is particularly important to build a warning framework for ecological and environmental risks to protect high-value ecological and environmental systems and achieve the sustainable development goals.

Since the Chinese President launched the Belt and Road Initiative in 2013, this grand blueprint has maintained a high level of interest and popularity at home and abroad. Relevant research has been carried out on the background, strategy, construction, opportunities and challenges, influencing factors, foreign investment, and empirical analysis of the initiative [1,2,3]. In the frequently cited literature, the relationships between the Belt and Road Initiative, economic globalization, and changes in the world pattern, respectively, are qualitatively explained, mainly focusing on scientific connotations, regional impacts, and construction. For example, Liu Weidong (2015) [4], Du Debin (2015) [5], T. Summers (2016) [6], and others have discussed the geographical strategic significance of the Belt and Road Initiative and believe that it has multiple spatial connotations and cross-scale characteristics. In addition to spatial restructuring and economic growth, the BRI will also have an impact on the ecological environment. In 2015, the Ministry of Science and Technology of China released a report on the ecological environment of the Initiative, combining remote sensing, geographic information technology, and multiple resource monitoring technologies. In 2017/2018, the data and reports were continuously updated, and several new topics were added according to key areas. The reports give a detailed introduction on the status of major resources and environmental ecosystems, such as forests, grasslands, and cultivated land, in the Belt and Road Economic Corridor [7,8,9]. In 2016, the Digital Belt and Road Initiative (DBAR) led by Guo Huadong (2018) [10], Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), saw the cooperation of experts from 19 countries and seven international organizations, with plans to invest more than CNY 200 million to monitor different types of ecosystems and their evolution in the Belt and Road Initiative, including grasslands, forests, glaciers, urban areas, farmlands, and coastal areas, and share the environmental and socio-economic information obtained through the Earth Big Data Platform. Based on the LUCC perspective, Zhang Jian (2022) [2], Yang Ronglei (2022) [11], Li Jiangyue (2019) [12], and others analyzed the ecological risks or service of countries along the Belt and Road, attempting to solve the dilemma of how humans will meet their land needs in the future while protecting the ecological environment. The green “Belt and Road” initiative has changed the past disorderly expansion of land use. This is of great significance to developing countries along the routes, most of which still retain their intact and original ecological environment, and will help them gain the understanding and support of governments, enterprises and the public of non-belt and road countries to jointly achieve the 2030 sustainable development goals [13,14].

Existing studies present in-depth discussions on the ecological and environmental conditions of land use/cover changes in the Belt and Road Initiative from the perspectives of natural and social sciences such as geography, ecology, management, and economics, from theory to method to practice, providing great help for policy implementation, project development, and planning. However, it was also found that most of the current studies focus on phenomenon analysis, problem diagnosis, and discussion of the underlying mechanisms of the ecological and environmental risks of land use/cover changes in countries part of the Belt and Road Initiative, with few going a step further and presenting a design for a set of sustainable land use plans with practical guiding significance. In this context, based on the spatial analysis of future ecological and environmental risks and according to the connotation of the sustainable development goals, we constructed an ecological and environmental risk warning framework for land use/cover in countries part of the Belt and Road Initiative. The research is of great significance for preventing and controlling ecological and environmental risks, jointly promoting responses to global environmental challenges and promoting green and low-carbon transformation in countries part of the Belt and Road Initiative.

The paper is divided as follows: first, a brief introduction is given to the research area, methods and objectives; subsequently, a warning framework for the Belt and Road is constructed, its ecological and environmental risk–importance is analyzed, a bivariate choropleth map is drawn, and a database is constructed; finally, corresponding development strategies are given according to the regional types and characteristics, and the next work is pointed out.

2. Study Area

As a large-scale regional cooperation platform jointly built by China and its neighboring countries, the Belt and Road Initiative has been proposed for more than 10 years. From the initial narrow geopolitical concept (with 65 major countries along the route) to the current broad foreign investment strategy (with more than 150 countries and more than 30 international organizations having signed a memorandum of understanding), the specific regional scope has still not been accurately determined. The official website of the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative claims that there is no upper limit to the Initiative. Some scholars have questioned this perspective, arguing that all of China’s foreign investment policies cannot be classified as the Belt and Road Initiative. The Initiative should focus more on China’s neighboring countries, mainly in Central Asia and Eastern Europe. Most geographical researchers agree with the geopolitical concept of the countries part of the Belt and Road Initiative, that is, the 65 foreign countries involved in the six land economic corridors officially recognized [2,10,11,12]. Therefore, we took the 65 countries part of the Initiative and China as the regional scope of the study, as shown in Figure 1. The region runs through the Eurasian and African continents, with an area of 5084.53 × 10⁴ km², accounting for 38.60% of the global total area of 13,172.90 × 10⁴ km² (excluding Antarctica). The range is between 10°55′36″ south latitude and 81°52′45″ north latitude, spanning about 90° from north to south, while the longitude is between 12°12′14″ east longitude and 169°30′12″ west longitude, spanning about 180° from east to west, from the Czech Republic in the east to Indonesia in the south, and the northernmost and easternmost are the territories of Russia. In order to facilitate the description of the change information of the geographical space, the countries were divided into Group 1 to Group 6, as shown in

Table 1. Countries and groups part of the Belt and Road.

Group	Nations
Group 1	China, Mongolia, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, Brunei, and the Philippines
Group 2	India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Maldives, Nepal, Bhutan, and Afghanistan
Group 3	Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan
Group 4	Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Moldova
Group 5	Iran, Iraq, Turkey, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Israel, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Oman, UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain, and Egypt
Group 6	Greece, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Poland, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Montenegro, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Albania, and Croatia

, according to their social background, cultural, and ethnic differences.

3. Research Methods, Objectives, and Evaluation System Construction

3.1. Bivariate Choropleth–Multiple-Criteria Decision Analysis (BC-MCDA) Method

Chaos and disorder are failures of design, not properties of information [15]. Displaying geographic spatial information on a map is both a science and an art. The visual experience of reading is important, and the effective choice of color scheme can greatly improve readability. Maps should be made to minimize visual noise and present information as intuitively as possible. Bivariate choropleth maps can directly and clearly display important information without forcing readers to frequently refer to the legend, and can also appear aesthetically pleasing to people. Bivariate choropleth mapping is a relatively new mapping method [16,17], although its history can be traced back to 1974, when the U.S. Census Bureau realized the value of combining two data sets into one map and recommended “crossing or superimposing choropleth maps of two different variables” [18]. This composition method of bivariate choropleth mapping has been successfully used to examine the relationships among social, economic, and natural variables [19]. Visualizing geographic information is extremely helpful in understanding the relationship between two phenomena. For example, thematic maps such as education and household income, health and obesity, and disease probability and public health planning can be used.

The BC-MCDA method, based on multiple-criteria decision analysis, takes advantage of the complementary advantages of MCDA and BC. A large number of different factors are mapped into two categories according to bivariate choropleth mapping, and the relevant data are integrated for multiple-criteria decision analysis to achieve the purpose of supporting system decision making. The principle of BC-MCDA is to use choropleth mapping (i.e., use color gradients to represent non-quantifiable dimension values) to create two intersecting “N × N” groups and display clearly distinguished primary colors between geographic units, where each primary color has different degrees of depth. Its main purpose is to accurately display the spatial relationship between two groups of variables by using a variety of strategies, such as different element colors, symbols, and shadow ratios. Variables can be any related theme pairing.

The specific steps of the BC-MCDA method are as follows [20,21]:

• Problem: First, the comprehensive decision-making problem is concretized according to the goal, defined and constructed into two different parts.
• Standardization: Since each parameter has its own physical unit and measurement scale, these values cannot be directly compared with each other. Therefore, standardization is required to convert the parameter value into an equal, dimensionless score, usually between 0 and 1, with values close to 1 indicating areas that fully meet the standard, and 0 on the contrary.
• Weight: Reflects the importance of each factor relative to the considered goal. Weights can be assigned using a variety of methods, such as the AHP method or the entropy method, and the numerical weights are determined by normalization and the maximum eigenvector of the ratio matrix.
• Superposition: After each parameter is standardized and the weight is determined, a single mapping is performed first, and then a bivariate choropleth mapping is performed. By converting the original counts into ratios or proportions, complex spatial problems between two relationships can be evaluated, determined, and solved.

In fact, BC-MCDA can also be considered a process of transforming and combining geographic data and value judgments to obtain decision-making information [22,23]. In this study, red was used to represent the ecological and environmental risk layer and green to represent the ecological and environmental importance layer. A value close to 1 (dark color) means that the ecological and environmental risk or importance of a region is very high, while a value close to 0 (light color) means the opposite, as shown in Figure 2.

3.2. Research Objectives

Although there are great differences in laws and regulations, management systems, monitoring, and technical support for ecological and environmental protection among the countries part of the Belt and Road, sustainable development is the goal of their joint efforts. Its significance lies in that it takes the future of the entire human community as the starting point; coordinates the contradiction between development and protection with a broader vision; avoids irreversible, serious consequences caused by short-term interests; promotes coordination between oneself and nature; and requires the coordination and unity of economy, environment, and society. In other words, while pursuing economic development, humans should avoid environmental damage and pay attention to social equity.

Achieving the sustainable development goals is a common moral obligation and responsibility of humankind, and the early-warning framework is built on this basis. The sustainable development goals were agreed upon by all countries at the 48th United Nations Statistical Commission in March 2017. After the levels were updated in 2022, the goal classification included 136 Level I indicators and 91 Level II indicators, and all goals were recognized as being equally important [24]. The goals related to this study were determined and summarized, as shown in

Table 2. Related sustainable development goals.

Environment
① 11.4: “Strengthen efforts to protect and safeguard the world’s cultural and natural heritage”.
② 12.2: “By 2030, achieve the sustainable management and efficient use of natural resources”.
③ 13.2: “Integrate climate change measures into national policies, strategies and planning”.
④ 15.1: “By 2020, ensure the conservation, restoration and sustainable use of terrestrial and inland freshwater ecosystems and their services, in particular forests, wetlands, mountains and drylands, in line with obligations under international agreement”.
⑤ 15.2: “By 2020, promote the implementation of sustainable management of all types of forests, halt deforestation, restore degraded forests and substantially increase afforestation and reforestation globally”.
⑥ 15.3: “By 2030, combat desertification, restore degraded land and soil, including land affected by desertification, drought and floods, and strive to achieve a land degradation-neutral world”.
⑦ 15.4: “By 2030, ensure the conservation of mountain ecosystems, including their biodiversity, in order to enhance their capacity to provide benefits that are essential for sustainable development”.
⑧ 15.5: “Take urgent and significant action to reduce the degradation of natural habitats, halt the loss of biodiversity and, by 2020, protect and prevent the extinction of threatened species”.
⑨ 15.7: “Take urgent action to end poaching and trafficking of protected species of flora and fauna and address both demand and supply of illegal wildlife products”.
⑩ 15.8: “By 2020, introduce measures to prevent the introduction and significantly reduce the impact of invasive alien species on land and water ecosystems and control or eradicate the priority species”.
Economy
① 10.b: “Encourage official development assistance and financial flows, including foreign direct investment, to States where the need is greatest, in particular least developed countries, African countries, small island developing States and landlocked developing countries, in accordance with their national plans and programmes”.
② 17.3: “Mobilize additional financial resources for developing countries from multiple sources”.
③ 17.2: “Developed countries to implement fully their official development assistance commitments, including the commitment by many developed countries to achieve the target of 0.7 per cent of gross national income for official development assistance (ODA/GNI) to developing countries and 0.15 to 0.20 per cent of ODA/GNI to least developed countries; ODA providers are encouraged to consider setting a target to provide at least 0.20 per cent of ODA/GNI to least developed countries”.

. They mainly refer to the following three dimensions.

(1) Economic sustainability: We should continue to encourage economic growth rather than restrict it on the grounds of ecological environment preservation. The economy is the foundation of human survival and a reflection of a country’s comprehensive strength. However, we should not only pursue quantitative economic growth but also attach importance to its qualitative development.

(2) Environmental sustainability: It requires that economic development be coordinated with the ecological environment; that the renewability of natural resources be ensured while utilizing them; that the limits of development be controlled within the carrying capacity of the earth; that the early warning, protection, and governance of the ecological environment be emphasized; and that the populations of all countries live in harmony with other species on earth.

(3) Social sustainability: The development stages of countries around the world may be different, and the specific development goals may also have different focuses, but the essence of development is the same and includes improving the living environment of humankind and the quality of life. Human beings are a community with a shared future. We should not be satisfied with pursuing the short-term development interests of our own country but should focus on the long-term goal of common prosperity. In addition to shouldering their own corresponding responsibilities and obligations, developed countries should also provide necessary assistance to less developed countries.

3.3. Construction of an Early-Warning Framework

According to the research objectives and requirements and taking into full consideration the ecological and environmental risks of future land use/cover change and the protection of important ecological and environmental factors, the BC-MCDA method was used to integrate relevant spatial data and construct an early-warning framework.

The ecological and environmental risk layer includes areas with high ecological and environmental risks in the future as ascertained based on land use/cover simulation prediction. It should be pointed out that there are many types of ecological and environmental risks. The research focuses on the macro-scale and the ecological and environmental risks mainly caused by land use/cover changes. The risk factor layers of landscape fragmentation, habitat quality decline, carbon storage function reduction, soil loss, and water eutrophication can already cover most of the situations [25]. The remaining ecological and environmental risks are not discussed here because (1) they are not major or suitable risks for study on the macro-scale. (2) They are not ecological risks caused mainly by land use/cover changes. (3) They are relatively complex and difficult to quantify spatially.

The ecological and environmental importance layer, based on relevant references [26,27,28,29,30,31,32,33], focuses on ecological population habitats, lakes and wetlands, important protected areas, and important carbon storage areas accordingly. This layer includes the most important areas in the world with rare, protected plant communities and rare and endangered animal species (threatened terrestrial vertebrate species), and areas with important water sources and biodiversity hotspots subject to natural resource protection (national parks, natural relics, protected landscapes/seascapes, sustainable use of natural resources, and other ecological and environmental protection areas), as considered by organizations such as the United Nations Environment Agency, the World Conservation Union, and the Institute of Conservation Biology.

All factors proposed in the United Nations sustainable development goals are equally important, and the weights were set to be the same. The constructed framework is shown in

Table 3. Ecological and environmental risk early-warning framework for land use/cover change.

Target Layer	Factor Layer	Element Layer
Ecological and environmental risk layer	Risk of landscape fragmentation	Variety of plaque types
	Risk of threats to habitat quality	Expansion of construction land
		Agricultural land expansion
		Traffic blockage
	Risk of decline in carbon storage function	Carbon sink degradation
	Risk of soil loss	Soil degradation
	Risk of water eutrophication	Nitrogen nutrients
		Phosphorus nutrients
Ecological and environmental importance layer	Important species	Important plant species
		Important animal species
		Biodiversity hotspots
	Important water sources	Lakes
		Reservoirs
		Rivers
		Wetlands
	Important protected areas	Strict nature reserves
		Wilderness areas
		National parks
		Natural monuments
		Habitat/species management
		Protected landscapes/seascapes
		Managed resource protected areas
	Important carbon storage areas	Climate regulation and conservation areas

.

3.4. Ecological and Environmental Risk Layer

As population and wealth grow, humans’ demand for survival materials such as food, land, and water increases [34]. Predicting future trends in land use change and the resulting ecological and environmental risks and taking appropriate precautions in advance are crucial for sustainable development. The ecological and environmental risk layer is composed of the risk factor layers of landscape fragmentation, habitat quality decline, carbon storage function reduction, soil loss, and water eutrophication. Each factor layer was processed in a dimensionless manner and re-adjusted to the range of 0–1. Multiple continuous variables were superimposed with equal values to obtain the ecological and environmental risk layer of land use/cover in the “Belt and Road”. The darker the red, the higher the ecological and environmental risk. The layer superposition results are shown in Figure 3.

In terms of spatial distribution, the land use/cover types in areas with high ecological and environmental risks in the future are mainly construction land and agricultural land with high human activity indices, which are distributed near transportation routes. These areas are densely populated, such as China’s eastern coastal areas, India, Eastern Europe, and Southern Europe. Mixed land use types, fertilizer use on agricultural land, industrial and residential wastewater treatment, or discharge on construction land have led to high risks of habitat quality threats, landscape fragmentation, soil erosion, and water eutrophication, affecting aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems.

3.5. Ecological and Environmental Importance Layer

Protecting the ecological environment and stopping climate change are the main tasks of the 13th and 15th sustainable development goals (SDGs) of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The ecological and environmental importance layer is based on the possible negative impacts of ecological and environmental risks according to a large amount of research results and existing authoritative and open-source data sets, which were used to select ecological and environmental importance factors. Each factor is composed of several independent element layers, which were standardized and readjusted (range: 0–1). Finally, the ecological and environmental importance layer of land use/cover in the “Belt and Road” was obtained through comprehensive superposition. The darker the green, the higher the environmental importance. The layer superposition results are shown in Figure 4.

In terms of spatial distribution, the land use/cover types in areas with high ecological and environmental value are mainly forests, grasslands, and waters with high carbon sequestration capacity, which are concentrated in places with abundant rainfall, high terrain, or steep slopes, such as Southeast Asian countries and the area from the Tianshan–Altai Mountains to the Himalayas. The landscape is concentrated and contiguous, with rich biodiversity, and is an important ecological service conservation area on the earth.

3.6. Superposition of Ecological and Environmental Risk and Importance Layers

The median method was used to map the ecological and environmental risk layer (Figure 3) and the ecological and environmental importance layer (Figure 4) into 7 quantiles, which were then cross-tabulated to generate a bivariate choropleth map with 49 unique color combinations. The final result is shown in Figure 5.

In this map, areas with high risk–low importance (mainly red) are characterized by frequent human activities and are not suitable for the survival of wild animals and plants. Those with low risk–high importance (mainly green) are the opposite, with few traces of human activities and important ecological conservation areas. High-conflict areas (mainly black) are warning areas of key concern. Low-conflict areas (mainly white) are places with harsh environmental conditions (e.g., cold climate or water shortage). The bivariate choropleth map shows more information than the traditional “binary” classification map, indicating the ratio of the relative risk and importance of ecological environment land use at each grid scale in the study area. In a broad sense, this map also represents the indices of economic returns and environmental loss caused by human activities.

4. Results

4.1. Analysis of Ecological and Environmental Risk–Importance by Type

The bivariate choropleth map was divided into four types of areas: low-conflict areas (wilderness areas), high-conflict areas (warning areas), areas with low risk–high importance (ecological conservation areas), and areas with high risk–low importance (economic development areas). The specific values and percentages of each area by group are summarized in

Table 4. Specific values of regions by type (×10⁴ km²).

Area	Group 1	Group 2	Group 3	Group 4	Group 5	Group 6	Area
Low conflict	542.55	105.17	286.13	1694.08	349.70	9.61	2987.23
High conflict	138.32	136.28	16.88	153.15	43.50	46.32	534.45
Low risk–high importance	422.19	71.05	58.40	452.94	112.56	36.00	1153.14
High risk–low importance	112.68	59.01	15.96	151.35	17.68	53.04	409.72
Total area	1215.73	371.50	377.37	2451.53	523.44	144.96	5084.53

and

Table 5. Regional percentage by type (%).

Area	Group 1	Group 2	Group 3	Group 4	Group 5	Group 6	Summary
Low conflict	10.67	2.07	5.63	33.32	6.88	0.19	58.75
High conflict	2.72	2.68	0.33	3.01	0.86	0.91	10.51
Low risk–high importance	8.30	1.40	1.15	8.91	2.21	0.71	22.68
High risk–low importance	2.22	1.16	0.31	2.98	0.35	1.04	8.06
Total area	23.91	7.31	7.42	48.22	10.29	2.85	100.00

.

The results in the table above are shown in percentage form below.

• High-conflict zones (early-warning zones)

There is 534.45 × 10⁴ km² of land in high-conflict areas, accounting for 10.51% of the study area. The top three groups by conflict level are Group 4, accounting for 3.01%, Group 1, accounting for 2.72%, and Group 2, accounting for 2.68%. Human activities are frequent in high-conflict areas, natural species and resources are abundant, and ecological and environmental risks and importance coexist. Representative places in high-conflict areas include the Gangetic Plain in India, the plains of central and southern Cambodia, the Indonesian archipelago, and the southern coastal areas of China. This type of land use faces great pressure. For example, Indonesia must meet the urgent economic and food production needs of the local area while limiting the threat of rapid land use expansion to the ecological environment. According to the main points of the 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs) of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, it is necessary to ensure development equity and “mobilize additional financial resources for developing countries from multiple sources”. If these countries can obtain compensation for international aid for ecological and environmental protection, it would greatly enhance their proactivity in this respect and help to balance local economic development and promote the transformation of land use into ecotourism or ecological conservation. Therefore, it is of great significance to formulate appropriate policies and systems to help these developing countries with high-value environments.

2.

High risk–low importance areas (economic development areas)

Following thousands of years of human development, the ecological and environmental values of land in this type of area has decreased, with a total of 409.72 × 10⁴ km², accounting for 8.06% of the study area. The top-scoring group in this aspect is Group 6, which has 53.04 × 10⁴ km² of land with high risk–low importance (accounting for 36.59%). In addition, these areas are also large: near Mumbai and New Delhi in India in Asia, North China and the Northeast Plains in China, and near the Alps in Europe. From the nighttime light data, it can be seen that this type of land is an area with frequent human activities, including important urban agglomerations and mostly agricultural land. This land type presents excellent economic, social, and natural environmental conditions; is found in either flat or coastal areas with convenient transportation; has clear location advantages; and is suitable for large-scale construction and development.

3.

Low risk–high importance areas (ecological conservation areas)

There is 1153.14 × 10⁴ km² of this land type, accounting for 22.68% of the total area. It is mainly distributed in the tropical rainforests of Southeast Asia, the West Siberian Plain in Russia, and the Tianshan Mountains and the Himalayas in Central Asia. These contiguous areas are the most important areas for biodiversity, ecological function services, and ecosystem regulation on earth, so it is particularly important to reduce human interference. Group 1 has 422.19 × 10⁴ km² of land of this type (accounting for 34.72%). In the past, developing countries did not pay enough attention to the ecological environment, and policy makers often tended to approve construction projects, which has led to significant damage to ecological environments such as tropical dry forests, temperate grasslands, and moist broad-leaved forests in Southeast Asia [35], for example, rare ecosystems such as the Aral Sea in Central Asia and Lake Urmia in Iran. The rich ecological and environmental resources on land are shared not only by humans but also by other animals and plants on earth. In line with the “Half Earth” action called for by famous biologist [26], these land areas should be given to animals and plants.

4.

Low-conflict areas (wilderness areas)

Low-conflict zones account for 2987.23 × 10⁴ km², or 58.75%, of the total land. The ecological environment presents low importance and risk and is usually concentrated in high-altitude or -latitude areas. These zones have poor natural environmental conditions, such as cold climate or water shortage, so they are less affected by humans. A cold climate area is Siberia, Russia, or Northern Asia. The land types are mainly cold tundra and cold coniferous forest. The area is known as the “Sleeping Land” (Sib Ir). Although it is vast and rich in freshwater resources, it is not suitable for the survival of humans, animals, and plants. A water-scarce area is the Arabian Peninsula. Due to its location in the subtropical high-pressure belt, it has scarce rainfall and abnormal drought. In addition, the geographical environment is barren, dry, and water-scarce—a desert. A total of 80% of the economic industries here are related to the oil and gas industry. The world’s second largest desert, the Arabian Desert, is located in the middle of his region. Until humanity finds a better way to use low-conflict zones, the safest course of action is to maintain their status quo.

4.2. Analysis by Type and Country

An analysis was then performed by country, taking China as an example. The area proportions of the four types of areas in China, namely, areas with low conflict, low risk–high importance, high risk–low-importance, and high conflict, were compared with the average levels of the study area, as shown in

Table 6. Comparison between China and the average levels.

Area	Low Conflict	High Conflict	Low Risk–High Importance	High Risk–Low Importance
China	52.35%	7.13%	26.06%	14.46%
Average	58.75%	10.51%	22.68%	8.06%

.

China has a vast territory and is home to important animal and plant habitats. The proportion of ecological conservation areas with low risk–high importance is 3.38% higher than the average level. The proportion of economic development areas with high risk–low importance is 6.4% higher than the average level, with most being on the east side of the Hu Huanyong Line. In addition, the proportions of construction land and agricultural land are also higher than the average of the countries part of the Belt and Road, indicating a high land use index. The Chinese proportion of high-conflict areas is lower than the average level, indicating that the presence of land suitable for development does not interfere much with important ecological environments, largely because these lands have been developed and utilized by humans since ancient times and the ecosystem has long been degraded. The bivariate choropleth map shows that the high-conflict areas in China are mainly distributed in Guangdong Province, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, Jiangxi Province, Hubei Province, and Hunan Province. Finally, low-conflict areas account for 52.35% of the total area, which is 6.4% lower than the average level, indicating that the proportion of areas with extreme environmental conditions in China is not large compared with the entire study area. Their spatial distribution mainly includes the western part of China, such as Gansu, Qinghai, Tibet, and Xinjiang. Overall, China’s ecological and environmental conditions are relatively good compared with the other countries part of the Belt and Road.

However, it should also be noted that China has been developing rapidly in recent years, leading to the acceleration of the human impact on nature and the rate of ecological space reduction. Due to rapid economic development and the population base, there is a large demand for land use, and China’s ecological environmental pressure is still very severe. In the following, for the example of China, the ecological environment risk layer map is shown in Figure 6, the ecological and environmental importance layer map in Figure 7, and the bivariate choropleth map in Figure 8. All maps of China use the standard map published by the Ministry of Natural Resources of the People’s Republic of China on the official website, approval number is GS(2020)4619, and the base map is unchanged.

Table 7. Top five countries in terms of proportion of four types of regions.

Area	First	Second	Third	Fourth	Fifth
Low conflict	Qatar	Egypt	Afghanistan	United Arab Emirates	Saudi Arabia
High conflict	Cyprus	Singapore	Lebanon	Bengal	Palestine
Low risk–high importance	Bhutan	Laos	Brunei	Armenia	Kyrgyzstan
High risk–low Importance	Hungary	Bahrain	Moldova	Slovakia	Romania

shows the top five countries in the four categories of ecological and environmental risk–importance. The results show that among the top five countries or regions with low-conflict zones, four are in Group 5—Middle East and North Africa. Their geographical locations and natural conditions are generally poor. Among the top five countries or regions with high-conflict zones, such as Cyprus, Singapore, and Lebanon, most are distributed in coastal areas, with small land areas, dense populations, and high pressure on land carrying capacity. The top five countries or regions with zones with low risk–high importance are often rich in natural resources, such as ecological environments, but present underdeveloped domestic economies and geographical and environmental conditions often unsuitable for large-scale human development. Countries or regions with a high proportion of areas with high risk–low importance are mostly distributed in Group 6—Southeastern, Central, and Eastern Europe. These regions have relatively developed economies, convenient transportation, flat terrain, pleasant climate, important locations, and superior geographical and climatic conditions.

5. Conclusions, Suggestions, and Discussion

5.1. Conclusions and Development Strategy Suggestions

Although the natural geography, climate, national conditions, and policies of the countries part of the Belt and Road differ, in line with the goals considered when constructing the early-warning framework system, it must be recognized that land use is not just a local or national matter. On the contrary, it concerns the well-being of all humankind and must be guided by long-term needs and sustainable development goals. Therefore, land use must avoid negative impacts such as the reduction in the quantity and the degradation of the quality of important ecological environments in order to be in line with the fundamental interests of human society.

• Areas with high risk–low importance (economic development areas)

Control development. Following years of development, the ecological environment in these areas has long been degraded and greatly affected by human activities. They are mostly distributed in flat-terrain areas with good location conditions, high transportation advantages, and convenient accessibility. Of course, many countries in these regions also encouraged uncoordinated development based on environmental predation in the early days, which led to the destruction of local ecosystems and the migration or extinction of species. In the future, it is necessary to strictly prohibit the arbitrary expansion of construction land and agricultural land, make good use of the existing developed land, adjust the spatial structure, and optimize the land use layout. Further, more attention needs to be paid to land use efficiency, utilization intensity needs to be improved, and development has to be performed in multiple dimensions to obtain the benefits of land function agglomeration.

2.

Low-conflict areas (wilderness areas)

Prudent development. It is expected that developing countries will continue to increase land use in low-conflict areas in the future. There is no doubt that developing countries have their own right to development and need more space and better infrastructure. However, during construction, we must also carefully consider the impact on the environment, plan first, consolidate the preliminary environmental investigation and impact assessment work, and integrate the concept of ecological priority throughout the entire process of planning, design, construction, operation, and maintenance. The following measures are further necessary: ensure the implementation of environmental plans, pay attention to resource coordination, promote the construction of green infrastructure characterized by low carbon, promote economical and intensive land use, coordinate the spatial layout, implement the protection of ecological functions, strictly control new projects crossing rivers and wetlands, integrate and optimize cross-sectional space, reduce energy consumption and carbon emissions, avoid waste and the degradation of land use, and improve the carrying capacity and efficiency of land use.

3.

Areas with low risk–high importance (ecological conservation areas)

Reduced development. Ecological conservation areas cover almost all the important tropical and subtropical forests in the world. From a biological point of view, they are the richest assets on earth. These areas are not suitable for large-scale development due to ecological and environmental losses caused by development, high construction costs, and long-term maintenance costs. It should be acknowledged that ecosystem services are externalities of irreplaceable value that are in short supply and that a good ecological environment is the greatest wealth of humankind. In the future, projects that have a greater impact on the ecological environment need to be rectified so that low-density villages will decline naturally, and the green transformation and development of land use can be promoted.

4.

High-conflict zones (early-warning zones)

Coordinated development. Land in high-conflict areas often has higher ecological and environmental risks but also has very high ecological and environmental value, thus presenting a dilemma. On one hand, the development rights of each country must be respected, but on the other, the ecological and environmental wealth belonging to all humankind must be protected. We can neither restrict the right to develop with only the obligation to protect, nor can we focus on development without paying attention to ecological and environmental protection. A solution satisfying both requirements is to introduce land development rights. The establishment and use of a land development rights system is an inevitable choice to achieve Pareto improvement [36]. The central idea is that in high-conflict areas, the country, organization, or individual with land ownership has the right to develop construction land and agricultural land, but if they do not do so and the ecological space is protected, they will obtain the corresponding benefits from the transfer of land development rights. Compared with the current situation, this solution offers an additional right to choose and an additional guarantee for the protection of the natural environment.

The source of funds for the purchase of land development rights can be established in accordance with United Nations sustainable development goal 17.2, which states that developed countries ought to entirely fulfill their official development assistance commitments, and goal 17.3, i.e., “mobilize additional financial resources for developing countries from multiple sources”. That is, the funds promised by international organizations and developed countries to provide aid aim to support ecosystem services to achieve the policy goal of ecological protection. This also addresses the fairness issue between development and protection caused by different development processes among countries to the greatest extent. At the same time, it is also necessary to explore a diversified ecological protection compensation mechanism, gradually improve the compensation standards, and mobilize more countries and organizations or private funds to participate. The implementation of the system for the purchase of land development rights can be achieved with various policy tools, such as ecological compensation, land consolidation fees, carbon sink trading, pollution emission indicators, and development land tickets. The specific payment amount is determined by the specific assessment of the development potential of the land in a certain area. Land development rights management and supervision departments can refer to the example of global climate change, set up a special committee, sign the framework, or establish a dedicated bank to ensure implementation.

Theoretically, the introduction and establishment of land development rights is conducive to the unification and coordination of the public, social, environmental, and economic interests of the “Belt and Road Initiative”, making up for the loss of land rights and interests caused by environmental protection and making it easier for all parties to accept. The establishment of land development rights can achieve the effects of improving land use efficiency, forcing inefficient land use to be abandoned, restoring the ecological environment, and promoting land use transformation.

In the future, a win–win scenario may be achieved if China and countries along the Belt and Road no longer focus on new projects but instead consider the high ecological and environmental externalities and maintenance costs in decision making [27,37]; encourage the planned demolition of unnecessary building projects through remediation, merger, and withdrawal, restoring ecological land; and use the valuable funds obtained from the transfer of land development rights for people’s livelihood and public service expenditures. In this way, the important ecological environment will be protected, and the developing countries can also obtain economic benefits.

5.2. Discussion

Faced with the pressure of land use expansion and ecological environment protection, early prediction, scientific planning, and overall regulation have become important measures for early warning. In this study, we used the BC-MCDA method to construct an early-warning framework, analyze ecological and environmental risk–importance, draw bivariate choropleth maps, establish a supporting database, and propose specific development strategies and institutional suggestions to address the ecological and environmental risks of future land use/cover change in countries part of the “Belt and Road”. The resulting plan plays an important role in maintaining the sustainability of the ecological and environmental system and reducing the contradiction between man and land.

The next step of research in this field could be based on the findings of this study, combining bivariate choropleth mapping diagrams and local actual conditions to unify local and regional connections and combine the macro-structure with micro-changes, so as to draw more targeted conclusions and suggestions. In addition, it is necessary to continue to dynamically update and adjust regional ecological and environmental risk and importance information to ensure timeliness, because from a dynamic point of view, such information changes under the influence of many factors. For example, due to developments and breakthroughs in science and technology, low-conflict wilderness areas have been found to offer useful resources, attracting human development and leading these areas to become risk areas. There are also regions where extensive farming has led to a decline in soil fertility, or poor development has led to the depletion of mineral resources, as a consequence of which risk areas have become wilderness areas. Finally, by converting farmland into forestland or ecological areas, risk areas have been transformed into ecological conservation areas. For high-conflict areas, a mutually recognized land development rights framework should be established and the purchase and transfer mechanism should be improved; at the same time, a trading and supervision platform should be established to regulate the responsibilities of all parties and prevent fiscal opportunism and speculation. Although the transfer of land development rights may be very difficult for many countries part of the Belt and Road with very large differences in social background and management systems, it is theoretically feasible to establish a land development rights system that is similar to international ecological compensation fees, mining transactions, and carbon sink indicators, but more comprehensive and advanced.