A Sustainable Land Utilization Pattern for Confirming Integrity of Economic and Ecological Objectives under Uncertainties

In this study, an integrated crop–forest system with market approach (ICFM) associated with recovering forest and withdrawing cultivation was developed for confirming regional integrity of economic and ecological objectives under uncertainties. A mixed quadratic stochastic-fuzzy programming method (QSF) was proposed for planning an ICFM issue under uncertainties. QSF can not only deal with spatial and temporal variations of meteorological condition, but also handle uncertainties expressed in terms of probability distributions and fuzzy sets. Meanwhile, it can also tackle nonlinear relationships between land resource plan and economic data. The developed QSF was applied to an ICFM issue in Xixian county, China. The results of adverse effects from irrigation, ecological effects from forest, land utilization with market approach and optimal system benefits were obtained. It can facilitate policymakers to adjust current land utilization with market approach to improve the productivities of land resources. The tradeoff between crop irrigation and forest protection can prompt generation of optimized plans with consideration of economic and ecological objectives, which can be availed to generate strategies for confirming integrity of socio-economic and eco-environmental sustainability.