A landscape pattern analysis-based methodology framework for Regional Planning Environmental Assessment (RPEA) was proposed in this study. It was developed for solving the shortcomings of the existing RPEA methods on security evaluation and systematical optimization of planned landscape pattern. The criterion for landscape pattern security evaluation and the indicators were established for landscape pattern dynamic analysis, i.e. cumulative environmental effect assessment. The analysis was conducted for population structure, landscape organization openness and landscape heterogeneity. The proposed methodology framework can reflect the main features of landscape pattern security, which will be helpful to carry out systematically dynamic analysis for the changes of regional landscape patterns before and after regional planning, and thus discriminate its defects in security. The developed method has universality, which can be applied to various scales of regional landscape pattern planning and RPEA. It can provide scientific support and practical basis for optimization of regional landscape pattern and industrial layout and enhancing regional landscape pattern security and sustainability. The case study results demonstrate the simplicity, practicability and application value of the proposed methodology framework. Compared with the original results, the security of the optimized landscape pattern was apparently improved. Therefore it can serve as a guide for implementation and management of regional landscape pattern planning. However, due to the limitation of insufficient data and information, the proposed classification criterion of landscape pattern security evaluation is a half quantitative criterion and tentative exploration. The distinction between levels is not fine enough. Further studies can be done to explore and subdivide the security and relatively secure levels, and the relatively secure level and insecure level. But it is believed to be of great value, especially the quantitative relationship between landscape pattern index and its security levels. The corresponding space control method should be the focus in the next studies.

Eco-environmental problems, especially those caused by resource shortage and excessive utilization, have become increasingly severe in China along with the high-speed economic development during the past few decades. Therefore, from a microscopic standpoint to analyze the practical problems of sustainable development and environment protection in the developed countries is of great significance to our amendment of regional development theory and implementation of policies and methods. Through four investigations on SADO Island, which is the last habitat for ibis in Japan, and deep interviews with the local government and residents, this paper reveals that after the announcement of ibis reintroduction promotion and creation of wild environment governance for ibis in SADO Island, a considerably large number of local peasants are against this due to the deterioration of agricultural production conditions and an increase in farm business cost. Therefore, the contradiction between environmental governance and regional development emerged and grew over time. The empirical study of Japan indicates that it is imperative to consider the development rights of less developed areas and the living rights of vulnerable groups, and it is of equal importance to allocate benefit from the public interest during the process of promotion for harmonious development between human and nature. Finally, it is urgent for the government to eliminate the inequity of allocation for ecological benefits and other related benefits, and to establish the Payment for Ecological Benefit system without delay.

2011年3月，《浙江海洋经济发展示范区规划》获得国务院正式批准，浙江海洋经济的发展已上升为国家战略。为服务于海洋经济发展示范区建设，必须深入挖掘并充分利用浙江的海洋文化资源。浙江省社会科学重点研究基地——浙江省海洋文化与经济研究中心积极组织青年学者，开展了浙江海洋文化的系列研究。目前，该研究中心的课题“浙江省海洋文化资源的开发与利用研究”前期系列成果——《浙江海洋文化景观研究》、《浙江海洋信仰文化与旅游开发研究》、《浙江海洋文化产业发展研究》已由海洋出版社出版。

国际地理学联合会农村系统可持续性专业委员会（CSRS）第19届年会于2011年8月1~7日在爱尔兰高威大学（NUI Galway）地理学与考古学院召开，该学院的Mary CAWLEY博士担任该年会组委会主席，来自全球18个国家和地区的70余位专家学者参加了此次年会。本次年会的主题是“农村系统的可持续性——地方和全球的机遇与挑战”，涉及6个议题：(1)土地利用、农业与食物；(2)遗产、旅游与环境；(3)经济社会变化背景下的农村社会、人口与居民点；(4)农村发展与管理；(5)农村和区域就业机会创造的新方法；(6)农村社会和可持续能源。

Urbanization development quality (UDQ) is the integrity of economic urbanization quality, social urbanization quality and spatial urbanization quality. The improvement of urbanization development quality is the key to expedite and facilitate the sound development of urbanization process in China. With the help of quadrant graph, through the analysis of the interactive coordination relation between urbanization quality, speed and urbanization level, the paper proposes 3D index ball and discrimination standard value of comprehensive measures of urbanization development quality, which is composed of three categories of indexes and 12 detailed indexes. By introducing Atkinson model, the paper constructs the sub-element measure model and segmental measure model of urbanization development quality, and further makes an overall evaluation on the characteristic of China urbanization development quality and its spatial differentiation. Studies show that during 1980-2008, China's urbanization development quality reached a medium level generally, and was improving slowly. However, the speed of quality improvement is lower than that of speed improvement. The classified urbanization quality presents the stance of economic urbanization quality < social urbanization quality < spatial urbanization quality; provincial urbanization development quality improves in varying degrees throughout China and exhibits the spatial and spatiotemporal difference of "inland→coastal area→inland→coastal area→ improvement in general", thus urbanization quality in the east is higher than that in the middle, and that in the middle is higher than that in the west. There is no correspondent relation between urbanization development quality and city scale. It is not true that the bigger the city is, the better the urbanization quality is. The result shows that population urbanization level does not reflect the quality of urbanization development.

Urbanization is an important comprehensive problem of social and economic development in contemporary China, involving fundamental issue of how to realize the goal of new and modern harmonious social development according to coordinated development of national economy, and sustainable development problem of rational utilization and long-term protection of resources and environment. After more than three decades of reform and opening up, socio-economic development has maintained a new situation of the rapid advance. Brilliant achievements in comprehensive national power, industrialization, urbanization and urban-rural integration have been obtained in China. Urbanization is not only the concept of historical development, but also the historical process of the objective laws of industrialization and social development. With the unprecedented advance of urbanization in the motherland, urbanization comprehensively promotes the tremendous economic and social development, and largely improves living standards and housing conditions of urban and rural residents. However, in recent 10 years (1996-2009), urbanization development has derogated from the principle of gradual and orderly progress beyond the normal track of urbanization development, which is called "the rapid urbanization" in the process. Recently, many scholars believes that urbanization in China shows "Great Leap Forward" and "Rash Advance". The main manifestation is the empty high speed of urbanization development, the excessive consumption of water and land resources, large-scale land occupation and land damage in the process of traffic construction in rural areas, medium-sized and large cities, and serious damage and pollution to natural eco-environment. Based on the above-mentioned situations, we suppose that urbanization in China should follow the requirements of scientific development view and think in a scientific perspective with the idea of seeking truth from facts and considering the special situation of China after our research and comprehensive analysis over the past years.

Influenced by postmodernism, qualitative research is based on in-depth interview and participant observation and other methods, to construct grounded theory by deep description. It is a cyclical and interactive process which emphasizes the participation and discursive power of research objects. Urban social geography proposed a unique spatial focus on city life. The western scholars increasingly emphasize the significance of qualitative research, influenced by the ideology of structuralism, humanism and postmodernism. Domestic research on urban social space was relatively late, and nowadays still pays more attention to the use of macro analysis based on statistical survey data. As a result, the lack of the depth in socio-spatial structure formation mechanism, as well as the neglect of human beings, leads to a sterile and dried research. Combining the western research trend and practical experience, this paper brings out different application prospects of qualitative research on urban social space on different scales, especially the micro and medium scales. The qualitative research can carry out the process of deconstruction, representation, retelling and grounded theory of urban socio-spatial structure. Key issues are discussed, including how to conduct in-depth interview, reflect space and spatial restructuring and construct grounded theory. It is necessary to have in-depth interview, find the proper research respondents, and adopt useful interview skills. The essence is how to reflect space and spatial restructuring in qualitative research and construct grounded theory. Based on the achievement made by the western related studies and the domestic facts, the use of qualitative research method can set up a firsthand database which will provide a remarkable amount of information on Chinese urban social space studies. During the qualitative research which emphasizes responsibility consciousness, researchers should avoid extreme like conceit and metaphysics and keep reflection attitude. Besides, further exploration of ethics, language construction and hypothesis verification is needed.

Based on the first and second economic unit censuses of Beijing, this paper uses the methods of Factor Analysis and Cluster Analysis to examine the pattern of urban functional distribution of the Beijing metropolitan region. Compared with 2004, the functional distribution changed much in 2008. The findings are as follows. (1) The urban functions were suburbanizing: the suburbanization of construction, transportation and manufacturing function was most significant, and producer services function and comprehensive function was characterized by suburbanization. (2) There were more significant spatial differentiations in the functional distribution of Beijing metropolitan region: the central area was specialized in producer services and public services function; the inner suburbs specialized in comprehensive function, technology and education services function, and the outer suburbs were specialized in construction, transportation and manufacturing function. (3) The functional structure of Beijing metropolitan region changed from "two developmental axes, two functional belts, and eight functional areas" to "two developmental axes, one functional belt, and six functional areas". The two developmental axes were the west-east axis along the Chang'an Avenue and the north-south axis along the traditional central axis. The functional belt associated with construction, transportation and manufacturing was located mainly along the Fifth Ring Road and extended to the outer suburbs along the main transportation line. The functional areas were composed of public services functional area, producer services functional area, technology and education services functional area, public and producer services comprehensive functional area, and manufacturing and technology services comprehensive functional area. This pattern was an synthesis of concentric circle mode, axial mode and polycentric mode.

This paper aims to analyze the mechanism that efficiency of banks and their branches are influenced by regional factors and spatial distribution of branches in the internet era. A theoretical hypothesis is put forward according to characteristics of securities industry in China that the performance of investment banks is influenced by spatial distribution of branches and internet. Based on a theoretical model, a series of comprehensive indicators are identified to integrate spatial information of all branches and the regional factors, and the competition in cities. The empirical study using cross-sectional data of Chinese investment banks from 2006 to 2008 shows that spatial variables, especially regional factors do matter to the performance of samples so far, while internet plays a positive role and the influence of different regional factors varies. It seems that the competition place is more important than competition structure in a city. And the smaller size of branch network is associated with higher performance. Finally, the policy meaning is discussed on aspects such as location strategy of banks to set up a new branch or adjust the spatial distribution of branches to gain better performance, and assessment of banking industrial power originated by spatial network, which is related to the choice of investors about investment of banks.

This paper studies spatial pattern and evolution location of urban logistics enterprises and reveals its general laws. Through establishing logistics space and attribute database of Suzhou during 1990-2007, with GIS spatial correlation analysis module and visualization, this paper applies quadrat, spatial autocorrelation and hotspot analysis to study urban logistics geographic distribution and evolution. The research shows the following results. (1) In recent 20 years, generally the logistics enterprise distribution has been in a state of agglomeration, but as time goes by, the decline of BPI marks a weakening tendency, for the logistics enterprise distribution expands from few intensive centers to other aggregation centers, lacking global higher and lower value centers. Thus, the distribution displays evolution and migration. (2) Globally, the hotspot of logistics enterprise distribution shows apparent expansion and migration. First, the area of hotspot evolves from singleness to multiplicity, and expands from downtown to sub-center towns. Second, the spatial expansion of hotspots shows the striking characteristics of being along the roads (G312 National Road and Shanghai-Nanjing Road) and river (Yangtze River). (3) Asset and non-asset logistics enterprises have significant differences in spatial distribution and pattern evolution: asset logistics hotspots have weakened in the downtown, further expansion and centrifugation, while non-asset logistics hotspots are mainly in the downtown, with obvious centralization and distribution along G312 National Road.

Modern theories on regional development hold that moderate differences in regional economic development facilitate the efficient allocation of resources and the shift of industries between regions, but the oversized differences will weaken the existing division of labor and economic cooperation, or even do harm to the regional economic and social stability. Taking the counties (including counties, county-level cities and municipal districts) of Liaoning as the study object and the GDP per capita as the measuring indicator, this paper analyzes the spatial-temporal pattern of economic differences in Liaoning Province from 2000 to 2009 by way of EDSA. The findings are that, the inter-county economy is highly auto-related, and the inter-county economic differences are enlarged first and dwindled afterward. In terms of local differences, the counties of "H-H" type are currently found mainly in Shenyang and Dalian, with a trend of extending to other coastal areas; the counties of "L-L" type are mainly in west Liaoning, including Fuxin, Chaoyang, and Huludao. The spatial distribution of counties with economic hotspots seems to be random and indefinite, with Shenyang and Dalian dominating them. Based on further analysis of the driving mechanism of the inter-county economic differences from the perspectives of historical development, locational conditions, policy implications and adjacency effect, the paper points out that, Shenyang and Dalian have firmly been established as the core of Liaoning coastal economic zone, and Shenyang economic zone since "Liaoning coastal economic zone" and "new industrialization and comprehensive reform pilot area of Shenyang economic zone" have been developed into "national strategies", but their radiation function and leading role are still limited.

Unlike the western academic circles, there are few studies on romance tourism in China. In Lugu Lake basin, Southwest China, the relationship between Mosuo men and female tourists is a particular case in romance tourism due to matriarchy prevailing among Mosuo people. The relationship derived from Mosuo traditional Walking Marriage can be defined as Tourism Walking Marriage. By means of interviewing Mosuo people and analyzing internet discourse, the author demonstrates that this new cultural phenomenon is the result influenced by the blending of Mosuo culture and Han culture, the misunderstanding of internet discourse, and the interaction of tourism. Through interaction between the tourists and destination, the placeness has been continuously expressed, experienced and reconstructed. This romantic relationship consolidates Mosuo men's cultural identity and develops their recessive cultural identity into a definite awareness of their own cultural identity.

Due to the presence of beautiful scenery or unique customs amid economic difficulties, many poor rural communities in China use tourism development as a strategy to alleviate poverty. However, after successful marketing campaigns make them famous, increased numbers of tourists in these locations with more money often cause more conflicts between residents, which could prevent these villages from developing. This study takes the Russian minority village of Shiwei on the Chinese side of the Sino-Russian border as an example. For a deep understanding of the kinds of development dilemmas residents face and how residents' perception and attitudes are formed, qualitative and quantitative methods were applied in this study. The results of this study suggest three contradictions in residents' attitudes to tourism in Shiwei. First of all, tourism development has brought positive social and cultural benefits to Shiwei, but most residents have a negative perception of economic benefits mostly due to a rich-poor gap. Secondly, surprisingly, it appears that residents strongly support the development of tourism, but more wealth does not bring more happiness to them. In contrast, feelings of happiness are most associated with a sense of being in control of one's life, and preserving local culture and existing harmonious interpersonal relationships. This finding confirms results from previous studies. Thirdly, most residents have a high dependence on the government and a strong willingness to participate in the development of local tourism, despite their very low opinion of government policy. The findings also demonstrate that the three groups have different characteristics. According to the results of this study, China's Pro-Poor tourism policy should make adjustments in order to ensure sustainable development. Firstly, the goal of the Pro-Poor tourism policy is not only about the economy and a higher income, but also about the fair distribution of wealth and protection of the indigenous culture, both of which should be at their core support of poverty alleviation for residents' happiness. Secondly, the policy should respect the different characters of community residents and should be dynamic so as to continuously give more opportunities to more poor people.

Scenario simulations of ecosystems and their services require the climate data mostly from the Global Climate Models (GCMs). Because of most GCM simulated data with the coarse resolution (about 200-500 km), it is difficult to use these data to assess impacts of temperature change on various ecosystems on regional and local scales, although the data can be used to effectively predict the future temperature change on a global scale. To address the above issue, the downscaling model of mean temperature is developed with the spatial statistical method in this paper, combined with series data of DEM, latitude and longitude. For validating the downscaling model, the mean annual temperature is simulated under the three scenarios of HadCM3 A1Fi, A2a and B2a during the periods T1 (1961~1990), T2 (2010~2039), T3 (2040~2069), and T4 (2070~2099). In the simulation process, the data resolution is downscaled from 3.75°×0.125° to 1 km×1 km by High Accuracy Modeling (HASM). Simulation results show that mean temperature would continue to increase in the future 100 years under the three scenarios of HadCM3 (A1Fi, A2a and B2a). During the periods from T1 to T4, the rising rates of mean annual temperature are the greatest under scenario A1Fi, the average levels under scenario A2a, and the lowest under scenario B2a, which might increase per decade by 0.29℃, 0.23℃, and 0.17℃, respectively. Furthermore, mean annual temperature would have a changing trend of accelerated increase under scenarios A1Fi and A2a, but the increasing trend would be slow under scenario B2a in the next 100 years. The results show that the temperature data with IPCC GCM's coarse resolution can be effectively downscaled to high-resolution temperature data that could be used to assess the ecosystems and their services on the regional and local scales.

Soil erosion caused by rainfall can affect water quality of the tourism river. This paper explores the regularity of effect of soil erosion on sightseeing water, which has certain practical significance of high quality display of tourism landscape resources. A survey is done on how rainfall affects water landscape quality in Shiliang scenic spot in Tiantai County of Zhejiang Province of East China. Through the field investigation, rainfall and tourism water turbidity data are obtained, and the relationship between rainfall and river water turbidity is established. After exploring the critical value of rainfall impact on tourism, rainfall characteristics, temporal difference and regularity of color changes, this paper points out that the threshold definition of characteristics of rainfall impact on tourism is related to the landforms, vegetation, soil and other relevant properties in the basin. Results show that the critical rainfall intensity of rainfall impact on tourism is 10 mm/ h, and the critical precipitation is 15 mm in Shiliang scenic spot. This paper proposes the concept of rainfall impact on tourism in the water landscape, and provides the reference method of determining the threshold of rainfall impact on tourism.

Identification of trends in long term time series of hydro-meteorological variables is an important topic for better understanding the effects of climate change and human activity on hydrological processes. In this study, data from five meteorological variables at eight stations in the upper and middle reaches of Heihe River Basin were analysed and the non-parametric Mann-Kendall test was employed to investigate their trends over the past years. It was found that on the annual scale, time series of average temperature, daily maximum and daily minimum temperatures at all selected stations presented remarkable increasing trends at the significance level of 0.01 (or 0.05, 0.001). Only annual precipitation time series at Tuole station showed a remarkable increasing trend at the 0.1 significance level and only sunshine hour time series at Shandan station showed a decreasing trend at the 0.05 significance level. All these trends were correlated with factors such as global especially regional climatic change, weather systems at different spatial scales, local environment and human activities.

This article conducts a systematic research on the spatial and temporal characteristics in the source region of three rivers on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, using 16-day 250 m NDVI and EVI of MODIS data in 2007. The results indicated that the spatial distribution of the NDVI and the EVI had very obvious regional characteristics, which presented a gradual reducing tendency of the NDVI and EVI values from southeast to northwest in the study area. The regular seasonal variations of vegetation index were very distinct, with the maximum value in August. The variation trends of two kinds of vegetation indices were consistent at different altitudes, which showed that the functions of NDVI and EVI were quite consistent. The difference value between NDVI and EVI gradually increased with the increase of vegetation index value, while EVI was more stable than NDVI as an indicator for vegetation variation. The research on the relationship between vegetation index and meteorological elements showed that the monthly mean temperature, precipitation and the vegetation index presented significant correlation dependence. In the study area, the correlation coefficient value between the current month precipitation and the next month vegetation index was much greater than that between the current month precipitation and the current month vegetation index, indicating that there was a time lag relation between the vegetation index and the precipitation. However, there was no relation between the vegetation index and the monthly average temperature. The effect of the precipitation on the vegetation growth was greater than that of the temperature.

Taking the invasive Spartina alterniflora in the Minjiang River estuary as test objectives, this paper studied the seasonal dynamics of kalium and biomass in different organs of S. alterniflora. The results showed that, on one hand, the kalium content in different organs of aboveground S. alterniflora was reduced gradually with the growing process in the general changing trend within a growing season. Except in the summer, the kalium content in green part was significantly higher than standing dead of S. alterniflora (P<0.05). The flower had maximum kalium content (8.97 ± 0.51 mg·g^-1) in winter and only appeared in autumn and winter. On the other, the kalium content of underground part of different depth roots, with no obvious changes, ranged between 4.38 ± 0.87 mg·g^-1 and 7.34 ± 0.56 mg·g^-1. In addition, the accumulation of kalium in green part was significantly higher than that of standing dead of S. alterniflora (P<0.05), while the main concentration was in the green stem, followed by green leaf. As for the underground part, the accumulation of kalium reduced with the increment of the depth, and had minimum kalium accumulation (7.89 ± 2.60 g·m^-2) in summer. To some extent, the total accumulation of kalium measured tallest in autumn (38.10 ± 3.38 g·m^-2), and lowest in winter (23.77 ± 6.38 g·m^-2). Except in winter, there are no significant differences (P>0.05) in the other seasons. Biomass and contents of kalium had different influences on kalium accumulation in different organs of S. alterniflora.

Based on the data of hydro-chemical ions of the lakes in the Badain Jaran Desert, we divided the study area into A, B and C subareas with Q-mode hierarchical cluster method. Besides, lake area information was extracted from the latest RS images to make a further study on the relationship with lake hydro-chemistry data. The results showed that the lakes of type A were all located in the southeast of the desert with a form of northeast-southwest belt, which included most of the lakes on the margin of the desert with lower total dissolved solids and least lake area. The type B lakes occupied most parts of the inland desert with a form of northwest-southeast belt. Remarkable differences in the physical-chemical characteristics were noticed in comparison of the two belts of A and B. A few lakes decentralized outside the A and B belts were classified into type C, for their physicochemical property was different from that in the vicinity as special cases of A and B belts, which may be related to the local geographic environment. We found that the effect factors are vitally different between southeast lakes and inland lakes based on the comprehensive analysis in quality and quantity of the lake water.

Land-use/land-cover change (LUCC) has effects on the composition of the surface structure of the ecosystem and ecosystem function, and threatens the regional ecological security. In this paper, the Hunhe-Taizi river watershed is taken as the study area, and land-use/land-cover data are extracted from satellite images acquired by Thematic Mapper (TM) sensor onboard Landsat-5 with object-oriented and interpretation methods in 1992 and 2007, then the ecological effect of LUCC in a basin scale. The results show that different ecological indicators have different responses to LUCC. (1) From the perspective of the landscape ecological pattern, some indexes in response to LUCC is weak, which mainly reflects the shape of landscape patch. On the other hand, some indexes responding to LUCC is strong, which mainly reflects the relationship between the ecosystem landscape patches. SHDI and AWMPED show an increasing trend, reflecting the ecological balance of the state class plaque was better and the degree of disturbance by human activity slightly decreased. CONTAG shows a decreasing trend, reflecting the increase in the degree of landscape fragmentation. (2) From the perspective of ecological functions, LUCC was better in some single factors of ecological function, such as vegetation cover, biological abundance, and soil conservation capacity in 2007 compared with 1992. When comprehensive functions of the ecosystem, including supply, regulation, culture and support, are taken into account, ecological effect is worse in 2007 compared with 1992.

Taking a land consolidation project for construction of citrus industrial belt in Wanzhou, Chongqing as an example, this paper discussed how land consolidation project could advance agricultural industry (construction of citrus industrial belt), by soil improvement and agricultural infrastructure construction from engineering technology and biological technology. The results suggest that pit planting method is suitable for dry land with deeper soil horizon, while trench planting method is suitable for dry land with thinner soil layer, and ditching-ridge planting method for paddy field. It is essential to dug trenches, back groove, and box groove at a distance of more than 1 m from citrus tree to get rid of the stagnant water in the soil. And, the main ditches among fields are supposed to construct according to landforms, so that surface water, soil water, and groundwater can discharge successfully. The pipelines as PVC and turnover pools are the crucial construction of irrigation systems. First of all, turnover pools connected to PVC pipes should be arranged at the location with high-pressure and large irrigation area. Secondly, the high-level pipes (Φ110mmPVC) and watershed area such as ponds, water reservoirs, natural ditches and irrigation canals are hooked up. Finally, portable water pumps and secondary pipes (Φ50mmPVC) should be matched. Aiming at constructing rural road network, the main field roads are supposed to arrange at a distance of no more than 200 m from the citrus trees, while the production roads with a width of 0.8~1.5 m should also be built at a distance of less than 75 m. In conclusion, both proper soil improvement measures and supporting agricultural infrastructure to fit in with the needs of different species of citrus are applied simultaneity for land consolidation model with the goal of construction of citrus industrial belt, depending on the complex and diverse conditions and different support services of ecological-economic functions in the Three Gorges Reservoir Area. Especially, more attention should be paid to soil plow layer protection, soil improvement and fertilizer, and sustainable ecological construction of rural roads and irrigation and drainage systems.

This essay is to explore the story of opening up new geographic perspectives, academic thoughts and sentiment of lofty moral character of Professor Bai Meichu, a geographer in modern China. Bai Meichu (1876-1940), geographer in modern China, was a teacher of Tianjin Zhili Women's Normal School, which is the predecessor of Hebei Normal University in the 1920-1930s. Then he became a professor of Beijing Women's Normal University and Beijing Normal University, and was engaged in the position of the Dean of the Geography Department of Beijing Normal University. Bai Meichu was studious and gifted since early childhood and became a Xiucai at the age of 15 before he attended the Jingsheng College. He devoted himself to intensive reading of Shan Hai Jing, Yu Gong, Han·Geography, Shui Jing Zhu, Xu Xia Ke You Ji and other ancient geographical books. In 1905, he attended the Beiyang Normal School and majored in geography, and was honored to be a Juren for his particularly prominent achievements. He was one of the initiators of China Geography Society in 1909, and became the Director of Editorial Board in 1913. He wrote some valuable manuscripts and historical data for earth sciences in China and acted as the editor-in-chief of Earth Sciences Journal for over 25 years. Bai Meichu was rich in writing all his life. Besides more than 10 professional papers published in Earth Sciences Journal, he had several influential books, including Province-wide Records over Republic of China (4,000,000 words), Construction Maps over Republic of China (32 maps), Reform Plans over Republic of China, Chinese National Humiliation Map, Refined Solutions on the Latest Material Construction, and China Human Geography (3 volumes). In 1913, he first proposed a new geographical concept: "Loving the nation is the top priority in learning geography, while building the nation is what learning geography for." He highlighted his innovative geographical ideas in his masterpiece Philosophy of Geography published in 1923. In this book, he expressed his ideas firmly as before about the properties of geography as natural sciences, and considered geography as a subject featured by macro-scope, time-effectiveness and social function. He also stressed various topics from the vision of man-land relationship".

Professor Chen Cai is a distinguished geographer as well as the founder of regional economic geography discipline in China, and his inaugurated academic research and practice make outstanding contributions to disciplinary construction of regional economic geography and national development. His main academic thoughts and contributions to the establishment and development of regional economic geography are listed as follows: to put forward the academic thought of three research aspects of economic geography in an earlier period; to carry out systematical research and practice on regional economic geography, then to establish and improve discipline system of regional economic geography; to initiate and deepen research on two basic theories, which has made pioneering scientific contributions to theoretical research of regional economic geography; to make great efforts to promote the empirical research and practical application of regional economic geography, and to make a breakthrough progress and historic outstanding contribution in some research and practice fields, including revitalization of old industrial bases in Northeast China, regional development in Northeast China, geo-relationship and regional international economic cooperation in Northeast Asia, and international cooperation and development in Tumen River Region; to devote himself to cultivating professional talents and academic activities of regional economic geography, which has promoted development of regional economic geography and enlarged the scope of research and practice on Chinese great realistic problems.

叶大年先生及其合作者的《城市对称分布与中国城市化趋势》一书,以一种新颖的形式展示了作者有关城市空间分布对称规律研究的理论和实证成果。从城市对称的基本概念、理论基础到分析范例,书中都系统地进行了表述。这本书的特色非常明显。其一是学科交叉性质。叶先生及其合作同事都不是地理学出身,但却推出了别具一格的地理学研究专著。其二是大家风范。作者视野开阔,纵览全球,广征博引而又能从容收放,思维方式往往一反常规而不斤斤计较于研究对象的细枝末节。其三是科学性。虽然没有人能够给出一个权威的"科学"定义,但"科学"的标准却是众所周知的,那就是可重复性和可检验性。书中列举的大量事例说明了城市对称规律的可重复性,书中的任何一个模式都很容易借助地图和相关的地理知识进行验证。其四是生动有趣。作品图文并茂,行文深入浅出。毕竟,好的研究一定是生动的研究,好的科学一定是有趣的科学。最后,特别值得称道的特色是,本书几乎没有实质性的参考文献——最重要的"参考文献"居然是中国地图和世界地图。这是真正的原创性作品。作者通过长期考察中、外地图发现了人文地理现象的对称规律,并揭示了城市对称分布格局背后的自然地理过程。

2011年10月7日~12日,由中国地理学会城市地理专业委员会主办的2011年城市地理专业委员会学术年会在南京大学和安徽师范大学成功举办。

Although red beds are a widespread landscape in China, geosciences academia fail to pay much attention to it, and a lack of collaboration among related fields results in a trend that different disciplines have different interpretations of the same issue; specifically, much concern on red beds, the fragile geographical unit, is highly needed with regard to land degradation and environmental problems. Humid area in southern China is one of the places where red beds are densely distributed. However, most of red beds areas are suffering from serious geomorphological catastrophes and soil-water erosion; even worse, many places are witnessing huge patches of 'red beds desert'. Even if we might admit that irrational land use contributes to the land degradation in red beds, there is no doubt that land degradation is a natural result of rock landscape evolution. This paper first indicates that natural evolution serves as a process of multi-factors' effect, which can be regarded as a system of mutual causality. Also, this paper analyzes the current researches on slope erosion mechanism of red beds landforms and areas, and raises scientific problems in red beds researches are facing with. Furthermore, this paper claims that a new interdisciplinary thinking of System Dynamics should be introduced to conduct a comprehensive research on the interrelation between red beds and landform development, natural catastrophes, soil erosion, environment degradation, overall geographic environment as well as production-living. Finally, this paper will hopefully find a way to promote land management and environment optimization.

Temperate steppe of northern China is very vulnerable and sensitive to climate change. It is significant to study herdsmen's perception and adaptation of climate change to enhance adaptive capacity and sustainable development of grassland area. Using a household survey based on questionnaire, this study analyzes the current status and behavior characters of herdsmen's perception and adaptation to climate change and extreme climate events in meadow steppe, desert steppe and desert respectively. The results showed that the climate became warmer and wetter in the last 30 years. There was more heavy snow in the east but more droughts in the west, and extreme climate disasters occurred more frequently in the last 10 years in the grassland area of Inner Mongolia. Although most herdsmen correctly perceived the change of temperature, they gave wrong judge to precipitation. Herdsmen in the east were more impressible to heavy snow and their counterparts in the west more impressible to droughts, thus different measures were taken to combat heavy snow and drought. Present adaptation measures taken by the herdsmen are basically simple and passive, lacking in effective and active ones to cope with the climate change in grassland area.

Northeast China plays an important role in food production and ecological conservation in China. Changes of wetness accompanying with global climate change could have significant impacts on food security and ecosystem health in the area. In this paper, the long-term trends of the aridity index are detected using Mann-Kendall approach for the period 1971-2008. The results of the trend test show that there was an insignificant increase of the aridity index in the region. To explore the cause of the trend, the sensitivity coefficients of aridity index in relation to climate factors including precipitation, temperature, vapor pressure, solar radiation and wind speed were calculated based on the Penman-Monteith method. It is shown that the coefficients related to actual vapor pressure were only slightly lower than those of precipitation, followed by those of temperature, solar radiation and wind speed. The sensitivity of aridity index to temperature decreased from south to north of Northeast China, while that for vapor pressure and solar radiation was largest in the eastern part of the region and the Changbai Mountains respectively. Under the impacts of climate change, the sensitivity coefficients related to temperature, wind speed and solar radiation increased, while the coefficient related to actual vapor pressure decreased. During the past 40 years, the increasing temperature and decreasing precipitation were the main reasons for increased aridity index, but increased vapor pressure, decreased solar radiation and wind speed had alleviated the increase of drought risk in the region.

In this paper, based on historical document and research of administrative history, a group of proxy indexes are selected to describe the spatio-temporal pattern of agricultural development in the Eastern Inner Mongolia (EIM) during the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911). In comparison of these reconstructed proxy series with local agro-climatic resources (temperature and precipitation) and historical climate change (temperature) in the corresponding period, some results are obtained as follows. (1) Agricultural development in the EIM during 1644-1911 was mostly concentrated in the area with annual accumulated temperature (≥10℃) ≥2500℃ and annual precipitation ≥400 mm; (2) Regions with better climate conditions were reclaimed earlier with a higher density of agricultural settlements compared with poorer ones. (3) Most of the sites that had bumper harvest and the main output regions in grain production were distributed in Chengde and its surrounding areas with the best climate condition in the EIM. (4) Agriculture developed more prosperously in warmer 18th century than in colder 17th and 19th centuries, with more active agricultural migration, northerner agricultural settlements into pastoral region, and almost all the records about bumper harvest grained output.