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Spatial and temporal variations of vegetation cover and the relationships with climate factors in Inner Mongolia based on GIMMS NDVI3g data

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Abstract

Variation in vegetation cover in Inner Mongolia has been previously studied by the remote sensing data spanning only one decade. However, spatial and temporal variations in vegetation cover based on the newly released GIMMS NDVI3g data spanning nearly thirty years have yet to be analyzed. In this study, we applied the methods of the maximum value composite (MVC) and Pearson’s correlation coefficient to analyze the variations of vegetation cover in Inner Mongolia based on GIMMS NDVI3g data spanning from 1982 to 2013. Our results indicate that the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) increased at a rate of 0.0003/a during the growing seasons despite of the drier and hotter climate in Inner Mongolia during the past three decades. We also found that vegetation cover in the southern agro-pastoral zone significantly increased, while it significantly decreased in the central Alxa. The variations in vegetation cover were not significant in the eastern and central regions. NDVI is positively correlated with precipitation (r=0.617, P=0.000) and also with air temperature (r=0.425, P=0.015), but the precipitation had a greater effect than the air temperature on the vegetation variations in Inner Mongolia.

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Acknowledgements

This study was supported by the National Key Technology R&D Program of China (2013BAK05B01, 2013BAK05B02).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Environment/Natural Disaster Research Institute, Northeast Normal University, Changchun, 130117, China

    Siqin Tong, Jiquan Zhang &  Wurina

  2. College of Geographic Science, Inner Mongolia Normal University, Hohhot, 010010, China

    Siqin Tong, Yuhai Bao &  Terigele

  3. Graduate School of Engineering, Gifu University, Gifu, 501-1193, Japan

    Weilisi

  4. Graduate School of Life and Environmental Sciences, Tsukuba University, Ibaraki, 305, Japan

    Lianxiao

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  1. Siqin Tong
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  2. Jiquan Zhang
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  3. Yuhai Bao
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  4. Wurina
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  5. Terigele
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  6. Weilisi
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  7. Lianxiao
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Correspondence to Jiquan Zhang.

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Tong, S., Zhang, J., Bao, Y. et al. Spatial and temporal variations of vegetation cover and the relationships with climate factors in Inner Mongolia based on GIMMS NDVI3g data. J. Arid Land 9, 394–407 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40333-017-0016-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40333-017-0016-4

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