Rainfall erosivity shows the potential ability of the soil loss caused by rainfall and it is a very important factor for predicting soil loss from agricultural hillslopes. EI₃₀ is a widely used index for quantifying rainfall erosivity. The 'E' portion of this value represents the rainfall energy, and the 'I₃₀' portion represents the maximum, contiguous 30-minute rainfall intensity during the storm. Normally, EI₃₀ values are calculated from breakpoint rainfall information taken from continuous recording rain gauge charts, however, in many places in China the detailed chart-recorded rain gauge data relative to storm intensities are not readily available. Obviously, the more detail of the rainfall data was used, the more accurate of EI values were given. In order to take advantage of hourly rainfall data in automatic meteorological observation stations and improve the precision of EI values. A total of 456 storm events in 5 soil conservation stations over eastern China were used to determine if EI values could be calculated by using hourly rainfall data (60-min interval data). Results indicated that the values of EI₃₀ based on the 60 min interval data were less than those calculated from breakpoint data. The average conversion factors (ratio of values calculated from the breakpoint data to those from 60 min interval data) for the five stations are 1.105 for the estimation of E values, 1.668 for I₃₀ values, and 1.730 for EI₃₀ values. The differences between two kinds of EI values based on breakpoint data and hourly rainfall data are mainly caused by maximum 30-min rainfall intensity. Hourly rainfall data can be used to accurately determine the rainfall erosion index values by using this function:(EI₃₀)_bp=1.730(EI₃₀)₆₀.The result could be used to improve the estimation of rainfall erosivity indices, and hence prediction of soil erosion in China.

Since the formal use by Prof. Pierre Bourdieu, the concept of social capital has been discussed and expanded in international academic field.In this paper, the authors definite social capital as social network and take it as the channel of resources distribution. The study paid attention to the impact of capital flow through the social network on local economy and its change with time. The social network chosen in the study is overseas relationship and the case studied is Xinhui, the famous overseas Chinese hometown in Guangdong province, with 713,000 overseas fellows that is 82% of the total population. Based on the analysis of statistical data, questionnaires and interviews, the authors found there are three ways of capital flow into local economy through social network, emigrant remittance,donation and direct investment. Emigrant remittance is the source of civil capital accumulation. Donation improved the local infrastructure. Direct investment contributes to the local economic growth directly. The importance of the three ways is different with time, but all played the key roles in the taking off of local economy. The authors also found that the impact of social network has a trend of weakening down. The amount of emigrant remittance and donation increased in the 1980s and then decreased in the 1990s. At the same time, direct investment has over past the former two ways.Considering the background of China's economic reform from planned economy to market economy since the early 1980s, social network played a compensation role between weakened planning and immature market. With the improvement of market institution, social network is withdrawing from the resources distribution. For local sustainable development, market building and environment improvement are more important in the future.

Spatial distributions of total nitrogen(TN) in soils are difficult to estimate because of their inherent spatial variabilities and lack of sufficient sample data.Soil-landscape model,based on parent material and topographic factors,was generated through applying GIS spatial analysis technique and a digital elevation model (DEM) in large areas.Based on 151 sample data, spatial distribution characteristic of TN was studied.Correlations between TN and topographic factors were analyzed and a regression model was established to predict TN content through linear regression analysis.The results for surface soils (0~20cm) showed that the average content of TN was 1.06g/kg in topsoil,with TN content between 0.5g/kg and 1.0 g/kg occupying the largest area (1580km²,49.3% of the total area) and that over 2.0g/kg the smallest(127km²,3.9% of the total area)in spatial distribution. Also,soils derived from sandstone and shale had the lowest average TN content (0.88 g/kg soil),soils developed on phyllite showed the highest average TN content (1.35 g/kg soil).Aspect among topographic variables had an important effect on TN content.The correlations of TN content with parent rocks,elevation and aspect were positively significant (P<0.05),slope exposure had the highest correlation with TN content (r=0.62).The correlation of TN content with slope was insignificant (r=-0.03).In the soils of the whole study area,the step regression analysis of the TN content, topographic factors and parent rocks showed that elevation,slope exposure and parent rocks were the best factors for predicting the TN content in topsoil (P<0.05).The multiple linear regression model is: TN=0.095+0.005×parent rocks+0.001×elevation+0.115×slope exposure classification n=113 R²= 0.637 The spatial distribution of TN content could be predicted by using a multiple linear regression model and DEM ( with a 30m×30m grid).

As a brand-new type of agricultural development, urban agriculture has gained its deserved attention in the world since the 1980s. With the irresistible trend of urbanization and serious urban-rural relationship, it theoretically is expected as a new concept and a route to create multi-function: economic, ecological, and social. In practice, however, the more important, but less discussed question is on how to make urban agriculture powerful and how to make it adaptable to the urban economic system. Empirical experiences tell that enterprise is the most effective form to organize and develop urban agricultural industry under the market economic system. It can organize the productive elements and balance the power and the interest among the stakeholders, such as the government, the farmer and other enterprises, all of which are playing crucial roles in the urban agricultural development. Based on the investigation of Mutual Benefit International Food Group Co. ,Ltd.(MBIF), this paper explores the mechanism and dynamics of the food processing oriented.urban agriculture enterprises.By aid of first-hand information and data, the discussion on the enterprise operation is expanded at three levels, from outside to the core. The outer mechanism discusses how the enterprise obtains the government and community support; the inner mechanism focuses on its production and management; the core mechanism is on the enterprise competitiveness formation by innovation and cultivating control power. Besides, the relationships among the above mechanisms are disclosed. According to the findings, the paper abstracts the development mechanism of food processing oriented urban agriculture enterprises as a"fish model". The paper further provides suggestive instructions on developing urban agriculture enterprises and makes amendatory measures on the existing problems. The authors finally come up with several key issues for the new but very promising industry, to strengthen the future urban agriculture development.

The spatial relationships of regions are a very important factor affecting club convergence of regional economic growth. By using the method of Markov chains, we have studied the club convergence of regional economic growth in Henan province, China from 1990 to 2004. We defined the spatial relationships of regions for neighbor regional environment, and then, have studied its influence on the club convergence of regional economic growth in Henan province in the same period using spatial Markov chains. The results show that there were four convergence clubs of regional economic growth in Henan province during 1990~2004, namely, high income club, middle-high income club, middle-low income club, and low income club. The spatial distribution patterns of the four convergence clubs were that high income club located mainly in central regions and northwest border regions of Henan province presents a C-shaped pattern with Zhengzhou, Luoyang and Jiaozuo as its pivot. The middle-high income club was mainly around the high income club. The low income club is a Y-shaped region that was composed of two parts, one was the east plain of Henan to the east of Beijing-Guangzhou railway, and the other was a northwest-southeast zone with low income in the west of Henan. The middle-low income club was relatively dispersed in space, mainly in Nanyang basin, as well as the border regions in the north of Henan. The high income club and low income club were more steady and expanded continuously in space. The levels and spatial structure of regional economic growth in Henan province have been more and more polarized. As a whole, the neighbor regional environment of a region had influences regularly on its economic growth and its transfer path from one convergence club to another. The economic growth and the probability of transferring into middle-low income club of a low income region were correlative with the economic growth levels of its neighbor regions positively. The middle-low income regions tended to be into low income convergence club. If its neighbor regions were with higher economic growth levels, the probability transferring into high income club of a middle-high income region was higher. Whereas, if the economic growth levels of its neighbor regions were lower, the probability of transferring into middle-low income club of a middle-high income region was higher. The economic growth and its steadiness of a high income region were less influenced by its neighbor regions. In addition, the regions that transferred from a club to another almost congregated in two or more than two regions in space.

Exchangeable phosphorus can be estimated by an infinite dilution extrapolation approach (IDE) and the first procedure of Hieltjes and Lijklema approach in the superficial sediments of shallow lakes in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River. Variation range and average amount of the NH₄Cl-P which can be determined by H-J approach and the IDE-P determined by IDE approach are studied for sediments with different pollution conditions. In addition, the quantity of the two forms of exchangeable phosphorus existing in those sediments is compared. The correlation between NH₄Cl-P and IDE-P and the proportion of NH₄Cl-P to IDE-P are analyzed. Recently, many researchers have focused their work on the effect of soil adsorption characteristics on soluble reactive phosphorus in solution. Some of the soil adsorption characteristics are estimated by soil test phosphorus (STP) and the degree of phosphorus saturation (DPS). In order to discuss the relationship between the two adsorption characteristics and the two speciations of exchangeable phosphorus, their linear correlations are discussed. The results are displayed as follows: (1)The potential exchangeable phosphorus determined by IDE approach and the exchangeable phosphorus quantified by the first step of H-J approach indicate that the contents of both are higher in the sediments which are seriously polluted and lower in those of slightly polluted. (2)The contents of IDE-P are higher than that of NH₄Cl-P in all kinds of sediments. The proportion of NH₄Cl-P to IDE-P verified greatly in different kinds of sediments. Because IDE-P is higher exactly in characterizing exchangeable phosphorus and more complex in procedure compared to the characteristics of NH₄Cl-P, proper approach can be chosen to make their results accord to the reality. (3)There are a good correlation between the two forms of exchangeable phosphorus and the soil adsorption characteristics of STP,DPS and other physio-chemical properties.

On the basis of introducing the connotation of the reference land price(RLP)and by adopting the comparative and analysis method,this paper analyzes the characteristics of RLP of the town in five counties of Hohhot from the aspects of nature, society and economy. The regional distribution of RLP and the relation between RLP of the towns and its influencing factors is expatiated. The conclusion is that no matter what level and what type of land, the direction is that the town RLP of Tumd Left Banner, Togtoh County and Horinger County is higher than that in Wuchuan County and Qingshuihe County. If the land level is high, the RLP is high, which shows their positive correlative connection of each town and reflects the difference in land locational condition and land use benefit. The RLP of land for business, housing and industrial purposes presents a decreasing trend, with an average ratio of 4.22∶1.50∶1. The distribution of RLP of business forms a higher price area because of facing primary road. The RLP for housing purpose becomes lower with distance accretion from town center. The RLP for industrial purpose is lower than that of land for business and housing, because benefit from industrial land use is much lower than the latter two and its locational request is relatively low. Town layout factor has important function in the evaluation of RLP of the towns. The RLP of the towns is closely related with the localional factors.Of the influencing factors of the town RLP, the natural condition mostly includes landform, climate, hydrology, the social condition mostly includes population status, perfect degree of public infrastructure and the economic condition mostly includes per capita GDP data, financial earning, per capita disposable income, traffic condition, etc. They collectively affect the RLP from different aspects. They show an identical changing trend with land price. The influencing factors should be improved to reduce difference of the RLP and promote development of regional economy. The research will play a stimulative role to develop land market of Hohhot in the future, guide reasonable, intensive and efficient exploitation of the land, and bring into play the land potential value, and afford gist and method for the grading of the urban land in Inner Mongolia. It will accelerate management of land market.

Marine container transportation is an important research field in Transportation Geography and has become the key support factors of international trade. In this paper, based on expounding about international and domestic research history of container seaports and seaports systems, the author took the world top 100 ports and data of the years of 1970-2003 as the studying objects, and discussed the developing and evolution course of world container seaports system.Then the author designed an index to appraise the spatial aggregration of world container transportation and container seaports, and their developing trends, including marine container transportation aggregration of port, region and country.In order to examine the developing mechanism of world container seaports system, the author analyzed the spatial coupling mechanism between world container seaports and international trade networks, through analyzing the international trade O-D data of the years of 1970-2003.Through research, the author drew the following conclusions.(1)World container seaport system witnessed the development course of "North American and West European port cluster→North American, West European and East Asian port cluster→East Asian port cluster→Chinese port cluster ".(2)There is the time period of spatial aggregration and diffusion about the world sea container transportation and now in the initial stages of spatial aggregration time, and the East Asian region became the world container transportation center.(3)Economic factors, shipping lines and port locations are the main driving factors for the development and formation of the world container seaport system,especially there is a coupling mechanism between the international trade networks and world container seaport system.

For detecting the applicability of classical urban population density models on the microcosmiclevel, this paper calculates grid-based population landscape density of Shenyang city, analyzes it's spiatial auto-correlation and variability using theories and methods of geostatiatics. It is found out that all semivariogram functions of populatin density fit with spherical model with negget in ten kinds of grains from 100m to 1000m, indicating that population distribution presents structural characteristics in the spatial extension of Shenyang city. But because of different grains, the auto-correlation scales, neggets, and stills, the rate of negget and still is different. This means that spatial auto-correlation of population distribution depended on the scale intensively, resulting in scale effects.By calculating semivariogram functions curves of different directions, it can be found that population density takes on a classical zonal anisotropy, which means that there were different structural characteristics in different directions for poplation distribution. The analysis of population density auto-crrelation and variability should be taken as bases for researching urban population density distribution. The impacts of grain on population density auto-correlation and anisotropy are objective, so more attention should be paid to choosing feasible scale and identifying structure of population distribution. In the specific time for a certain city, the condition of population distribution is objective, while population density models are abstract expressions of population distribution characteristics, whose parameters are only quantitative indexes of expressing population distribution pattern. So, when researching spatial structure of population distribution in a city, the emphases should be put on how to identify spatial structural characteristics of population distribution, rather than on how to apply classical population density models mechanically.

In the past twenty years, the Environmental Kuznets Curve has been regarded as one of the most powerful tools in studying the relationship between economic growth and environmental pollution. Conventional studies usually use the linear model or the log-linear model to examine the existence of the Environmental Kuznets Curve. However, from analytical viewpoint and empirical behavior, the performance of the linear model or the log-linear model is suspected for their strict restrictions, such as linearity, nonnegative property, and symmetry. Consequently, conventional linear methods for the Environmental Kuznets Curve studies can not be a fine econometric tool. With a view to the above shortcomings in describing the Environmental Kuznets Curve with the linear model and the log-linear model, this paper investigates the relationship between economic growth and environmental pollution in China, using panel data models with the Weibull specification and the Gamma specification, where all the three parameters are used to describe the "shape", "scale" and "shift" of the curves, respectively. In this study, we select per capita waste water emission, per capita waste gas emission and per capita solid wastes generated as the environmental indexes, and per capita gross domestic product (GDP) as the income index with the 29 provincial data over the period from 1989 to 2005. The results show that panel data models with the Weibull specification and the Gamma specification are both simulated better than that with the log-linear model, and their parameters have good explanatory capability. It is also suggested that with the rise of per capita income, per capita waste water emission in China first increases and then decreases, appearing a turning point around 25 000 yuan, while per capita solid wastes generated and per capita waste gas emission take on monotonously increasing relationships which have quite high income turning points.

In this paper, the authors made a fractal analysis on the spatial structure of tourist scenic spots systems of Nanjing, based on a latest tourist resources survey, to explore the characteristics of spatial structure.The authors chose 14 leading tourist scenic spots as samples to analyze random aggregation fractal dimension, grid information fractal dimension and correlation fractal dimension of the spatial structure of tourist scenic spots systems. Through analyzing fractal dimensions and individual fractal dimension coordinate, the author concluded that it is feasible to apply fractal approach to study the spatial structure of tourist scenic spots systems in Nanjing. Analyses of three fractal dimensions all lead to the same conclusion that the tourist scenic spots systems in Nanjing have a fractal spatial structure and show a tendency of self-organization optimization. Hierachical centers and spatial geometrical centers overlap each other and form a mature fractal spatial structure. Pillar attraction dots in each tourist spot are close to each other, providing ideal order and sequence and well-arranged spatial structure, thus leading to an optimized independent operation. To be exact, the random aggregation fractal dimension D=0.6818, less than 1. The spatial structure of the whole tourist spots network shows a strong random aggregation while the density of tourist spots lowers down quickly from the center to its surroundings. Grid information fractal dimension also presents a highly-centered layout of tourist spots in Nanjing. Its value approaches 1, which shows that tourist spots gather along certain directions in spatial arrangement. And the correlation fractal dimension reveals that the spatial structure of tourist spots is of a multi-fractal feature with varied fractal structures, which means that the spatial structure of the system has not reached an ideal self-organization optimization, or retrogradation has occurred to some degrees.The tendency of self-organization optimization has been interrupted by some unexpected factors and the spatial structure needs new adjustments.

Choosing weighted average travel times as indicator, county as research unit, this paper analyses the accessibility patterns of highway, railway, waterway and civil aviation respectively in the Yangtze River Delta under opening conditions, with these results, the accessibility patterns of integrated transportation are elaborated. The accessibility of highway takes on a layered pattern with Shanghai, Suzhou and Jiaxing as the center, which implicates the transport convenience of nodes within the region. Most nodes are better but those located in the south of Taizhou and Zhoushan (Zhejiang province) are worse in railway accessibility. In waterway transport, the accessibility shows an arc belt pattern, with better accessibility, in the center composed of Shanghai, Ningbo and Zhoushan, the belt along the Yangtze River in the north and along the East China Sea in the south but it decreases southwestwards and northwards (northeastwards).The accessibility of civil aviation takes on a south-north symmetry pattern approximately, having nodes with better accessibility concentrated in the middle part. Shanghai is the best node in civil aviation accessibility, Hangzhou, Nanjing and Ningbo are better than those nodes around them, which form the "islands-shaped" pattern. As to integrated transportation, Shanghai and nodes around it are best in accessibility, centered around this area, the accessibility decreases to the periphery, and the area with better accessibility forms "Z-shaped" pattern, which is consistent with the regional transport and megalopolis pattern, and the accessibility of the nodes in the south and north edge are worse, as a whole, the north is better than the south and the east is better than the west in accessibility. According to the analysis of accessibility coefficient, the highway is the best one in equilibrium of accessibility distribution, integrated and civil aviation transportation takes the second place, waterway is worse, and railway is the worst. For the sake of integration of this region, the consummation of integrated transportation system should be focused on improving the accessibility of the edge nodes in the future.

The rise of New Economies, which refer to those knowledge-based, new-technology-intensive, innovation-driven, services-dominated, and globalized economic activities, has been impacting on cities in many aspects. Taking the city of Xi'an as a case, viewed from a perspective of urban geography, based on a variety of empirical data as well as some widely acknowledged understandings of the inherent features of New Economies, some representative spatial impacts (or potential impacts) of New Economies on the ongoing urban transformation of Chinese cities are analyzed in this paper. Besides, the implications of these impacts for city planning and decision-making are also discussed, and some suggestions on policies are given accordingly. The results indicate that: (1) with the development of New Economies, the spatial pattern of the city's industrial space has been transformed, in which the city's new development zones and university belt are growing up into vigorous and productive new industrial spaces, while the traditional old industrial districts declining into stagnant and problematic areas; (2) with the development of New Economies, there has been also an evident growth of office-buildings and relevant facilities; (3) because of the inherent connection between the two major branches of New Economies, i.e. the hi-tech industries and the advanced producer services, the city's Hi-tech Industrial Development Zone (HTDZ) are developing not only into a cluster of hi-tech industries but also a high concentration of various modern services and emerging as the city's new CBD; (4) the compatibility of New Economies with residential plots has led to a synchronous development and spatial integration of New Economic area with residential area;and (5) with the development of New Economies, there may also be an intensified polarization of urban socio-economic space.

To study residents’ perception toward tourism impact is of practical significance for developing tourism industry.Taking Luya Mountains Nature Reserve as a case, the background characteristics of the residents engaging in tourism industry and the perception toward 27 indices about tourism impact are investigated on the spot, and the relationship between their characteristics and the perception level is analyzed by two-way indicator species analysis (TWINSPAN) and detrended correspondence analysis (DCA) in the paper.The results show that: (1) TWINSPAN is a kind of better classifying way, and can divide 32 samples into mature and active group, immature and active group, retreating group and apathy group. (2) Each group has its own distribution area and borderline on the DCA ordination figure. Axis 1 of DCA reflects the samples' sex and income mainly, and Axis 2 shows their education level. (3) The distribution pattern of dominant factors decides on the distribution pattern of the samples' groups to a great extent. (4) The classification of TWINSPAN needs to combine with actual fact, and DCA can eliminate "arch effects" obviously. The result of TWINSPAN is consistent with that of DCA, and both are comparable. Both can show the ecological relationship between the residents engaging in tourism industry and their perception toward its impact objectively. However, it still needs farther studies on how to express their interrelationship more directly.

To put up with the lack of flow and current direction data among tourism destinations, which are important for research, this paper illustrates the different spatial field effects of tourist flow of Taiwanese visiting Mainland China due to the choice of different ports, by taking the database technique based on the principle of network analysis. It was found that the tourist flow relation among tourists taking Guangzhou-Guangzhou and Shanghai-Shanghai respectively as their entry and exit ports is comparatively better developed; then comes Beijing-Beijing, Shanghai-Guangzhou. However, the spatial field development of tourist flow among tourists taking Beijing-Shanghai(or Shanghai-Beijing) and Beijing-Guangzhou(or Guangzhou-Beijing) respectively as their entry and exit ports is much weaker. Such a pattern of spatial field effect should be attributed to the combined impacts of factors like regional supply of tourist resources, the tourist market demand (such as preference for products and limited time for traveling), transport media for traveling (intensity and tightness of airline network linkage) and marketing of travel agencies. The result of such a research could provide reference for the cooperation and development of regional tourism of Taiwanese visiting Mainland China. This paper only analyzes some factors such as the subjective initiative of tourist flow(the disposable time for traveling), the intermediary condition (transportation intermediary, marketing of travel agencies) and so on, which make the spatial effect of tourist flow of Taiwanese visiting Mainland China based on airports change. But the paper neglects the influence of some attribute factors of tourism destination, for example economic, political and social structures, geopolitical relations and so on, which decides the intensity and range of the tourist flow's spatial effect to a certain extent. How to bring these factors into the quantitative research on the tourist flow's spatial effects is still awaiting to be further explored and make breakthroughs.

The question of regional convergence is of great interest to regional scientists,but the majority of empirical studies of regional convergence in literature have been focused on the traditional convergence methods in which the geographic entities are treated as "isolated islands" and have not explicitly considered the regional spatial dependence. In this paper, methods of exploratory spatial data analysis and spatial autocorrelation model provide new insights to explore spatial dependence relation of Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Metropolitan Region over the 1992~2003 period. Furthermore, using spatial econometrics, income convergence was computed by using three different models, which are spatial lag model, spatial error model and traditional convergence model. Some results are drawn as follows: (1) Spatial dependence plays an important role in analyzing regional income convergence. The application of exploratory spatial data analysis methods revealed strong evidence for spatial dependence of regional economic growth and improved traditional convergence model. (2) The specification of traditional convergence model is misspecification due to ignoring spatial dependence. Spatial lag model and spatial error model,which take spatial lagged dependent variables and spatial lagged error terms into account based on traditional convergence model, optimize the structure of model, and give helpful hints of the meaning of convergent economy-policy. (3) A spatial analysis of Moran scatter plot of GDP per capita indicates that economic growth is also highly spatial dependence in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Metropolitan Region between 1992 and 2003, namely, a high income county with high income neighbors and a low income county surrounded by low income neighbors. (4) Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Metropolitan Region converges to a specific steady-state in GDP per capita from 1992 to 2003.At the same time,Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Metropolitan Region is the phase of polarization and economic disparity is big,the rate of convergence is small.

It is of great significance, both theorefically and practically, to study the change of the port-city relationships. Under the background of globalization, the relationships between ports and cities have become more complicated and subtle than at any time, and can be summarized as follows: Firstly, the relationships based on handling cargoes have decreased, while financing trade relationships are increasing. Secondly, the change tendencies of different ports-cities may vary from one to another. In this paper, the author first analyzes the associative structure between port and city, and then use gray correlative analysis to measure the effect of Nanjing port-city interactive development under the background of globalization. A practical formula of the mean associative degree (MAD) is designed for determining the direction and degree of dynamic change of the port-city associative degree. By calculating the concerned statistics from 1990 to 2001, it can be clearly seen that MAD in 1990 is 0.68679, which is relatively high, then there appeared a steady tendency to drop. In 1994, MAD reached its minimum which is 0.63763, following a steady tendency to rise. In 1998, MAD reached its maximum which is 0.8853. But then an evident drop took place. According to these results, the authors hold that there are two obvious features of the effect: (1) On the whole, the effect of Nanjing port-city interactive development is relatively notable. (2) There are obvious differences in the change tendencies of the effect in the 3rd phase.A systematic analysis has been carried out on the formation causes of the effect change of Nanjing city-port interactive development. This paper holds that the following factors have profound implications on it: the change of industrial structure of Nanjing, the changing function of Nanjing port, the intense competition between the ports all around, the administrative system of port and the development of international trade.

Upon entering the 21st century, planning and building of eco-city has not only become a hotspot of research, but also gradually got to the common understanding of the whole society. It is the most important of all to renew and upgrade the depurative ability of urban-compound-ecosystem by building eco-hub. This article puts forward the conception and meaning of eco-hub, summarizes its five categories of functions, including landscape axis effect, climatic modification effect, intensive economic development effect, biodiversity effect and eco-safety effect. It emphasizes the necessity to build eco-hub, and taking Nanjing city as an example, analyses the conditions, schemes and corresponding measures for eco-city building.The following conclusions are drawn: Firstly, with the development of modern eco-city, it is necessary to plan and build eco-hub. We should build a multiple ecosystem in order to solve questions brought by urbanization and industrialization. Being the "CBD" of this system, eco-hub must be built first. Secondly, eco-hub becomes the key step to upgrade the function of multiple ecosystem because by its powerful function it can combine each natural element and improve its efficiency. This can make full use of multiple eco-system, and the city environment can turn better and better by natural function instead of manpower. Thirdly, despite of rapid development of economy and technology in China in the new century, building eco-hub is a long and hard work. Each of us should do something for it.

In order to satisfy the traveling demand which grows unceasingly and tends to be diversified and multilevel, the traveling industry chain is extending unceasingly and forming comprehensive tourism which has high interrelations with other industries and has multiple combined earnings. Comprehensive tourism is a kind of mature pattern of the tourism industrial development, which is broader and more comprehensive than the traditional tourism industriy in aspects of connotation. In this paper, the connotation, the characteristic and the industrial system of comprehensive tourism are discussed explicitly, especially from the viewpoint of the exploitation of advantageous resources, the resources substitution and the industrial substitution. Furthermore, the impacts, effects and benefits of comprehensive tourism industry are analyzed from both theoretical and empirical study, based on the case of Gansu Province.The authors emphasized in this paper that tourism can accelerate less-developed areas to win the multiple benefits in regional economy, society and ecology, as well as resources comprehensive utilization. Compared with traditional industry, comprehensive tourism has obvious advantages and prospects in regional development. In terms of theory, the comprehensive tourism industry imposes its impacts on the economy, the society and the ecology which are universal and multilevel, reflecting in three aspects: impacts on national economy, impacts on social development and impacts on environment. In terms of empirical study, on the basis of theoretical study, the data analysis of Gansu Province has been carried out, which showed that comprehensive tourism, as a new high growing industry, had strong economical, social and ecological impacts in the province. The paper concluded that being an environment-friendly industry with multi-benefits and impacts, comprehensive tourism has the functions of driving regional economic development, increasing employment, mitigating ecological pressure, especially in the less-developed areas. Some policy suggestions have been made to the development of comprehensive tourism in a more scientific and effective way.

Rural feature is the fundamental characteristic of countryside tourism. To carry out evaluation of rural feature can help to lay the foundation for the research of a sustainable development of rural tourism. It is also important for the development, operation and management of countryside tourism. Based on the analysis on the content of countryside and rural tourism, five major factors, namely, geographic condition, tourism resource, community participation, localization of tourism industry and sustainable development are identified. According to structural equation, a countryside feature evaluation model is proposed in which the variables of the causal link are connected with arrow path. Its relevance is expressed using coefficients (threshold ＞0,＜0.95 ). In this essay Wuyuan in Jiangxi Province is used as an example. SPSS statistical software was used for the multiple regression analysis of the observation matrix of the sample; path coefficients and random errors were obtained. F test and fit test were conducted for each regression equation. The result shows a high reliability. T test was conducted for the path coefficient with t values between 2.319~86.895 and P values being P＜0.01 or 0.05. The causal relationship in the model was obvious and in line with the assumption of the study. Thus the model can be accepted.

Tourism resources exploration potential evaluation can be defined as the capacity of tourism resources to develop tourism industry and to gain economic, social and environmental benefits. The evaluation of tourism resources exploration potential involves not only the value of tourism resources themselves, but also environment conditions and development benefits which are necessary for the tourism resources development.Ot the basis of the combination of AHP approach and Grey Theory, this article tries to innovate the evaluation approach of tourism resources exploration potential by applying the multi-level grey approach. In the empirical study, Laozi Mountain Tourism Attraction is taken as an example.First, key factors which have important influence on tourism resources are analyzed and then evaluation index system of tourism resources exploration potential is established. It consists of three hierarchies, and is composed of 12 indexes. Second, the tourism resources exploration potential of the above six scenic spots in Laozi Mountain Tourism Attraction are evaluated and sorted based on the multi-level grey approach. The study shows that the result of the multi-level grey evaluation of tourism resources exploration potential is objective and reliable; it doesn't require a large sample and is very effective to fill in the gaps such as inexact and incomplete evaluation information. In addition, this paper applies multi-level grey approach in the evaluation of tourism resources and makes a comparative analysis between the evaluation result of tourism resources and that of tourism resources exploration potential. The study indicates that there is difference between them, high rating tourism resources does not mean prospective exploration potential. The evaluation of tourism resources exploration potential is more comprehensive and is helpful to resolve the conflict between tourism resources rating and tourism resources exploration potential.

Although the current practice of administrative division adjustment in China promotes regional governance and urbanization economies, it does not effectively resolve the conflicts between central city and surrounding county-level cities. This paper examines the influence of administrative division adjustment on economic development in Changzhou, Jiangsu Province, and analyzes problems such as key sectors, spatial distribution and location choice related to the city's development zones. This paper focuses on industrial and urban spatial development issues arising after the administrative merger in 2002, which converted Wujin into a district of Changzhou. The city in this case has fast-growing market forces but lacks efficient governance, which is a quite common situation for cities in the Yangtze River Delta. We examined the major institutional, policy, socio-cultural, and spatial planning factors underlying these problems. We argue that the incongruence between administrative division adjustment and the existing institutional framework is the fundamental source of conflicts among the constituting parts of the city. Inconsistencies among spatial plans made by different government bodies are manifestations of these divides. They also undermine implementation of regional plans and policies. Finally, from the perspectives of institution, policy, and space, we explored strategies for the spatial integration of economic development in Changzhou. Institutional adjustment is essential for the city to achieve sustainable development and enhance economic competitiveness. Policy making should emphasize regional development goals, and policymaking process should combine the bottom-up and top-down approaches to create a good framework for diverse but coordinated economic activities. The regional perspective should also guide the spatial integration, and spatial planning that has strong legal and intellectual bases will play a key role in achieving city-wide coordinated development in Changzhou.

This paper analyzes the spatial pattern of financial services industry and the impact of enterprises' financial service consumer behavior on that by using first-hand data obtained through questionnaires and in-depth interviews. The city and second-hand data are from socio-economic statistics(1991-2004)and second basic units census(2001). The results are as follows: Firstly, a decentralized spatial pattern of financial services industry in Dongguan has been formed as nearly the same as that of secondary industry, which means that these two industries are linked closely to each other. Secondly, the enterprises invested by Hong Kong's and foreign capital are now searching the opportunity for supplying the financial services in Dongguan, Pearl River Delta (PRD) and the whole country. Except PRD, Hong Kong and other areas are becoming the main sources of financial services for enterprises located in Dongguan. Thirdly, the producing bases of multinational corporations, successful Hong Kong enterprises and town-owned industrial firms facilitate the spread of financial services in the town by making the consumption standard and the financial services normalized. As a result, the decentralized spatial pattern of financial service industry has come into being. Finally, the consumer behavior of different enterprises is dissimilar, so is its spatial effect. Comparatively, the 'park-style’ consumer behavior of financial services of town-owned firms mainly represents the distinction of less out-of-town consumption and its facilitation to the development of financial services is limited to the scale of township. While the multi-spot style' consumer behavior of multinational corporation producing base plays a key role of causing the spatial centralization and decentralization of financial services with different spatial dimensions at the same time.The 'twin-spot style’ consumer behavior of enterprises in Hong Kong, oriented by extensive and in-depth investment and trade between Hong Kong and Guangdong Province, is the micro behavior basis of two processes, which are the industrialization of Pearl River Delta and the transformation of Hong Kong's economy from manufacturing to services industry and the medium for establishing closer financial linkage between Hong Kong and Pearl River Delta.

From the perspective of potential accessibility, according to the transport condition among the regions, this paper builds up the network model, and calculates, forecasts and analyses the potential spatial accessibility pattern in Guangzhou-Hong Kong Urban Corridor with integrated GIS tools, based on analyzing the current accessibility data in the landway transport network in Guangzhou-Hong Kong Urban Corridor, using the shortest time distance index and the weighted average travel time index. The latter index uses population in the future as its weighted factor. As a result, the potential accessibility of landway transport network in Guangzhou-Hong Kong Urban Corridor presents a concentric circle spatial pattern either the shortest time distance index or the weighted average travel time index, and the inner accessibility level is better. The accessibility level goes worse from the center to the periphery. The author transforms the results of these two indices into accessibility coefficients for the purpose of comparison.The results show that the accessibility status of the south corridor is improved and the north one is weakened taking the potential population factor into account.Finally, the potential accessibility level is compared with the current one. It is suggested that the former is more balanced that the latter, the overall accessibility level is improved, and the lower the original accessibility level is,the more it improved.

According to the rule and framework of urbanization and eco-environment coupling, the system dynamic model of the coupling system between urbanization and eco-environment in Jiangsu province has been designed by means of SD method. Based on Jiangsu’s serial statistical data from 1990 to 2003, the five scenarios of the coupling models during 2000-2015 have been simulated. The results show that: Firstly, for there exist complex, nonlinear and changeable characteristics of the coupling system between regional urbanization and eco-environment, in terms of SD merits, it is applicable for the SD to deal with the complexity resulted from regional urbanization and eco-environment coupling. The accuracy assessment with historical data covering 1990 to 2003 indicates the SD model is reliable to a certain extent, which can reveal some complex actions of the coupling system and evaluate the potential effects that urbanization intimidated eco-environment. Secondly, there exist significantly differences among the five development models, which show both comparative advantages and drawbacks. Thirdly, according to the characteristics and regional disparities of Jiangsu development and the general rule of world urbanization, it is revealed that only when either population urbanization model or society urbanization model to be adopted correspondingly can the sustainable development among population, economy, urbanization and eco-environment be realized.

The spatial structure of metropolitan area is the most integrated and most diverse part of urban system. It is composed by different ranks of spatial elements such as cities (nodes), spatial flows (functional linkages), channels (linkage axis) and action fields (the attraction range of each city) and so on. The spatial structure of metropolitan area is represented as the spatial combination relationship of three factors including point (city and urban system), line (economic linkage channels) and surface (urban hinterland). Based on the statistical data of Wuhan metropolitan area in recent years, using SPSS mathematical statistical technique and GIS spatial analysis function, we build an economic linkage intensity model and investigate the dynamic characteristics of the spatial competition and its range of Wuhan metropolitan area. It is found out that: (1) there are some main linkage directions in the external economic linkage of central cities, and its temporal inertia and spatial polarization are also very obvious; (2) the external economic linkage intensity of central cities is distance decay, which leads to a regional layered spatial structure. Then from the aspects of point, line and surface, we build and compute some useful indices which are the centralities of economic linkage node (central city), the network connectivity of economic linkage channels (transportation network) and the regional organization of economic linkage range (urban hinterland). With the aid of these indices, we can quantifiably analyze and point out the hierarchical characteristics of the economic linkage spatial structure of Wuhan metropolitan area. It is concluded that: (1) the centrality hierarchy of central city is quite different, their spatial distribution is uneven and has close relationship with transportation location; (2) the development and service function of linkage channel is hierarchical, and two inter-city transportation channels have been formed significantly; and (3) the influence range of economic linkage is closely related to external economic linkage intensity of central cities, and it is also greatly affected by its regional natural condition and administrative regionalization.

Zhongyuan urban agglomeration is an important spatial platform advancing "rise of middle of China", also the indisputable main item realizing "rise of the Zhongyuan Plains" in Henan Province. In the integrated development of Zhongyuan urban agglomeration, the construction of the urban system with perfect structure and formidable function is a special important historic task, and the structure optimization of the urban system is a key problem that should be solved properly. The essence of the structure optimization of the urban system is, through government's macroscopic plan regulation and urban agglomeration's integration, to realize the high degree of harmony of the cities with different ranks, different scales and different functions in the spatial platform, thus realizing the promotion of the urban system's overall strength, and finally realizing the sustainable development of urban agglomeration. The primary content of the structure optimization of the urban system in Zhongyuan urban agglomeration is: the rank level optimization, the scale sequence optimization, the function type optimization and the spatial layout optimization. First, the rank level optimization of the urban system. This article uses the law of "city centricity intensity" to divide the rank of all cities in Zhongyuan urban agglomeration, and then constructs four rank levels of the urban system. Second, the scale sequence optimization of the urban system. This article uses the gray system GM(1,1) model, and, according to the status, economic development situation as well as population machinery growth foundation of different cities, to extract the optimized target of the non-agricultural population of various cities in 2020. Third, the function type optimization of the urban system. This article incorporates industries into 8 departments reflecting city function activities, uses Nelson's(H.J.Nelson) statistical analysis principle and method to determine the superiority functions, the prominent functions, the function intensities and the specialization indexes of the cities in Zhongyuan urban agglomeration. Fourth, the spatial layout optimization of the urban system. Around 2020, Zhongyuan urban agglomeration will form an overall pattern of city space layout and function display: "two circles, double nucleuses, four belts and one triangle".

The relationship between climate change and vegetation dynamics has been identified by recent studies in global and regional scales. Based on previous researches and AVHRR GIMMS NDVI and AVHRR GloPEM NPP data sets, this paper analyzes the response of vegetation dynamics to climate change in the southwestern karst region of China since the early 1980s by extracting each pixel's information. The results show that: (1) since the early 1980s, both vegetation cover density and net primary production have the ascending tendencies. However, interannual variation rates of vegetation indexes have apparent spatial differentiations; (2) correlation coefficients between the interannual variations of vegetation indexes and the interannual variations of climate factors also have apparent spatial differentiations; (3) various vegetation types have different responses to climate change, and the annual mean temperature variations have more significant impact on vegetation dynamics than the annual precipitation variations;and (4) the distribution laws of correlation coefficients between the interannual variations of vegetation indexes and the interannual variations of climate factors under different climate conditions are apparent. The study of the response of vegetation dynamics to climate change in the southwestern karst region of China will enrich our knowledge of the natural courses which impact the stability of karst ecosystems and provide scientific basis for the management of karst ecosystems.

R&D activities are the most important parts in the progress of innovation, and play a crucial role in the technological innovation. R&D hub, which is a cluster of R&D organizations, firstly appeared in the 1990's. It is not only important to the firms and organizations attached to it, but also may make great contributions to the development of regional economy. The basic conditions which are of great importance to the formation of R&D hubs are analyzed here. This paper classifies the regional conditions which will contribute to the formation of R&D hubs into two types: capital basis and innovative environment. Furthermore, capital basis is divided into industrial base, human capital and social capital; while innovation environment is divided into infrastructure, service sector and institutional circumstances. On the basis of theoretical analysis, the paper compares the basic conditions of Beijing with Shanghai. The indexes chosen include: level of informatization infrastructure, location quotient of high-tech industry, human capital condition and social capital condition. Finally, it comes to the following conclusions: Beijing, which has advantages in human capital, could grow into R&D hub of mixed form, however, it still needs to make great efforts to develop the service industry. Compared with Beijing, Shanghai is not only good at human capital, but also good at commercial elitists and culture. So Shanghai could develop into an innovative R&D hub.

Global warming affects productivities of plants, and then, the structure and evolution of community. Located in the Xilin River basin in eastern part of Inner Mongolia Highland in North China, the typical primary Leymus chinensis grassland impacted by the global warming has shown depletion to some extent. In order to probe the relationship between global warming and botanic community changes, based on the multi-species competition models given by Tilman and others, this paper puts forward a dynamical model, which is focused on multi-species competition under the condition of disturbances caused by global warming, to simulate evolution of first four dominant species in Leymus chinensis grassland in Inner Mongolia Highland for several score years, which are Leymus chinensis,Stipa grandi,Artemisia commutate and Achnatberum sibiricum. The model considers the proportion of the aboveground net primary productivities (ANPP) of the four species as variables in place of the proportion of sites occupied by species in Tilman's model. The simulated results show: (1) The order of dominant species from the strongest one to the weaker ones would not change if the rate of temperature rise is less than 0.06℃ a^-1 in Inner Mongolia Leymus chinensis grassland, China, during the given period of 60 years; otherwise, the original odd dominant species of the first one and the third one will retreat to the second one and the fourth one, and the original even dominant species, the second one and the fourth one, will evolve to become the first one and the third one. The new order is Stipa grandi,Leymus chinensis,Achnatberum sibiricum and Artemisia commutate. (2) The time of rank exchange for the former two dominant species precedes the latter ones. (3) If the rate of temperature rising is more than 0.17℃ · a^-1, the new order will be Stipa grand, Achnatberum sibiricum, Leymus chinensis and Artemisia commutate.The simulated results of the order of the first four dominant species' aboveground net productivity are approximately in accordance with field investigation data under the condition of annual temperature arising by 0.086 during 1980-1994 in this area, although there is disagreement with time scale. Results of this research would provide useful enlightenment for predicting Leymus chinensis grassland evolution and helping people to manage it.