Regional disparity and convergence of China’s inbound tourism economy

Comprehending regional characteristics and influencing factors of China’s inbound tourism economy is important to make effective policies that will help inbound tourism develop harmoniously and shrink regional disparity. This paper studied the regional disparity and convergence of China’s inbound tourism economy during 1996–2008 with the methods of σ-convergence, club convergence and β-convergence. The results indicate that 1) inbound tourism receipts per capita (ITRPC) of the whole country, the eastern, central and western regions presented the rapid increasing trend; 2) ITRPC of the whole country was characterized by convergence; 3) the eastern region presented club convergence, but the central and western regions did not show this trend; 4) the star-hotel levels and investment in fixed assets for the tourism industry per capita had a same trend to growth rates of ITRPC, promoting inbound tourism development, and there was no difference among the 31 provinces (municipalities) in the mainland of China; 5) but the proportion of employed persons in the tourism industry accounting for total population and the proportion of the tertiary industry accounting for GDP had a reversal trend to growth rates of ITRPC, shrinking the provincial disparity in inbound tourism economy, and there were differences between the developed provinces and the developing provinces. Based on these analyses, we put forward some suggestions for the developing provinces to speed up inbound tourism economy.     

Foundation and application of background trend line of China’s inbound tourism

Modern inbound tourism in China has been developing for 20 years, a trend line of inbound tourists in statistical data began to show. This paper introduces the concept of tourism background trend line, and explores its two functions as a barometer in demonstrating fluctuation in the tourism economy and as a forecaster in forecasting tourism development. The tourism background trend line is a new concept, the word “background” derived from environment science, refers to the “trend line” which reflects the dynamic curve or dynamic equation of tourism development without considering the impact of unexpected incidents. The introduction of this concept was inspired by Karl Marx’s comments on the relation between value and price. Tourism background trend line reflects the summary of multiple factors involving tourism resources, tourism demand, population growth, the scale and speed of economic development, and the spatial interaction between tourism origins and destimations. It demonstrates the natural and stable trend and the temporal law of tourism development in a country or region. The tourism statistical curve is at random, susceptible to disruptions and disturbances from serious political, economic and environmental happenings, but it always fluctuates around the background line. Tourism background line can reveal the potential of a country’s tourism development. Compared with the statistical line, it can be used as a “barometer” indicating ups and downs of tourism industry in the past. When naturally extended, the background trend line also can be used for forecasting the trend of tourism development in future. In this paper, 4 tourism background trend lines of China’s inbound tourists, i. e. foreign tourists, Hong Kong/Macao/Taiwan tourists, overseas Chinese tourists and total tourists from abroad, were established with statistical data from 1978 to 1996. And the impacts of the Political Event in 1989 (or Tiananmen Square Incident) on China’s inbound tourism were evaluated. The result shows that the impact of the Event was not limited within one year, but it stretched over 3 years. The total loss was 20 million in tourist arrivals and $1620 million in foreign currency income. The paper also studied the trend of China’s inbound tourism in the next 4 years. Foundation item: Under the auspices of National Natural Science Foundation of China. Brography: SUN Gen-nian(1961 —), male, a native of Xi’an City, Shaanxi Province, master of science, associate professor. His research interests include environment science, geography modeling and MIS for tourism.     

Applicability and prospect of China’s development zone model in Africa

Development zones have been an important spatial approach to promoting economic development since China's reform and opening-up. They have also been major contributors to the processes of China's industrialization and urbanization. Along with improvements in the worldwide industrial division of labor and the gradual implementation of China's development zones' Go Global strategy, it is necessary for Africa, a hot spot of global industrialization in recent years, to learn from China's development zone model. By attracting China's capital, technology and enterprises to Africa via Sino-African co-built development zones, a pattern of high complementarity and mutual development between China and Africa can be formed which does favor further improvement of the global industrial division of labor. In order to study the applicability and prospect of China's development zone model in Africa as per the above-mentioned international situation, this paper first sorts out the development course of China's development zones and discusses their roles in China's industrialization and urbanization. Subsequently, this paper analyzes the status quo of industrial development in Africa as a whole and the differences in industrial development between China and Africa, aiming to justify the timing of industrial transfer from China to Africa by constructing Sino-African co-built development zones. Lastly, this paper analyzes the current situation of six Sino-African co-built development zones by focusing on their operation modes, industry types and investment promotion models. In the authors' view, Sino-African co-built development zones can function as a new window of China-African cooperation, a new carrier of African industrialization, and a new engine of global industrial restructuring. China should adhere to the general principles of ‘Sino-African Integration, Multi-Cooperation, Mutual Benefit, Scientific Location, Systematic Planning, Cluster Growth and Open Development' in the planning and construction of development zones in Africa, effectively promoting Africa as the very important part of the global industry system.     

The effects of natural capital protection on pastoralist’s livelihood and management implication in the source region of the Yellow River, China

The interaction among different livelihood capitals is a key to generate a deeper understanding of the livelihood sustainability.In this paper,we use net income per capita(economic capital),meat and milk production per capita(physical capital),and areas of fenced pasture,livestock shelter,grassland rodent control and planted grassland(physical capital) as proxy indicators of livelihood promotion,livelihood provision,and livelihood protection respectively.By developing a correlation model between pastoralists’ livelihood protection and improvement,we found that(1) there is a statistically significant correlation between the pastoralists’ livelihood protection and promotion;(2) based on the maximum effect of pastoralists’ livelihood promotion and provision,there is a benchmark in the effect of the intervention intensity of livelihood capital(grassland resource protection) on livelihood improvement;(3) on basis of two indicators,i.e.net income per capita and meat production per capita,the reasonable scales of fenced pasture,livestock shelter and planted grassland are less than 843,860 and 46 thousand hectares(hm2) per year respectively.With the marginal effect of livelihood protection,moderately decreased areas of fenced pasture and planted grassland,and increased area of livestock shelter is a critical to ensure pastoralist’s livelihood sustainability.     

China’s potential of grain production due to changes in agricultural land utilization in recent years

The changes in utilization of agricultural land have gradually grown into one of the major factors impacting grain output in China. This study explores the various components of agricultural production in China from the land utilization perspective, involving changes in grain production per unit area, multi-cropping index, and adjustment of agricultural structure. Compared with the record values, different research methodologies are used to analyze the potential of above three components. The results indicate that grain production potential of 65.68×109kg was unexploited in 2006, in which 45.8×109kg came from the restructuring in agriculture. So we can infer that the reduction of grain production in China could be primarily attributed to agricultural restructuring in recent years. So the productive potential can be fully restored by increasing agricultural investment, or recovering agricultural structure in favorable conditions. So we can say that China's current condition of food security is good.     

Distribution orientation and driving mechanism of geographical pattern change of China’s banking industry

By analyzing the relationship among government, market driving forces, distribution orientation of banking industry, service opportunity equality and spatial patterns, this paper proposes that it is distribution orientation that lead to the formation and evolution of spatial pattern of banking industry. The difference of the distribution orientation leads to the separation of the spatial pattern of banking industry, and the change of the distribution orientation leads to the change of spatial pattern. The degree of spatial pattern change is subject to the degree of change of distribution orientation, and the scale of bank resources in the regions, which supports the distribution orientation variation. Based on these theoretical frameworks, some indicators were designed to analyze the pattern change of China’s banking industry and its effects since 1995 under the change of the distribution orientation. This paper finds that the orientation of economic benefit maximization driven by market causes the banking industry to concentrate in economically developed regions. The government, which does not follow the orientation of economic benefit maximization, plays a role of stabilizer. Since the bank branches in the regions with the greatest change in bank branch distribution are too few, and regions with the greatest change in bank loan allocation are the regions with lots of loans, the pattern change of the banking industry in physical form is not as notable as that in economic form.     

Spatial and Temporal Variability of Thermal Stress to China’s Coral Reefs in South China Sea

Coral bleaching, caused by elevated sea surface temperature(SST), is occurring more frequently and seriously worldwide. Due to the lack of field observations, we understand little about the large-scale variability of thermal stress in the South China Sea(SCS) and its effect on China’s coral reefs. This paper used 4-km high resolution gap-filled SST(Filled SST) data and thermal stress data related to coral bleaching derived from Coral Reef Temperature Anomaly Database(Co RTAD) to quantify the spatial and temporal characteristics of chronic thermal stress and acute thermal stress to China’s coral reefs in SCS from 1982 to 2009. We analyzed the trend of SST in summer and the thermal stress frequency, intensity and duration during this period. The results indicate that, as a chronic thermal stress, summer mean SST in SCS shows an average upward trend of 0.2℃/decade and the spatial pattern is heterogeneous. Waters of Xisha Islands and Dongsha Islands of the northern SCS are warming faster through time compared to Zhongsha Islands and Nansha Islands sea areas of the southern SCS. High frequency bleaching related thermal stress events for these reefs are seen in the area to the northwest of Luzon Island. Severe anomaly thermal stress events are more likely to occur during the subsequent year of the El Nino year for these coral reefs. Besides, the duration of thermal stress varies considerably by anomaly year and by region.     

Population expansion in China’s metropolises and its scale-control

Metropolises are centers of politics, economy, culture and information, and also economic growth poles in comparatively large areas. After 1949, China’s urban structure have changed greatly, from original "pyramid" shape into "upside-down pyramid" shape, that is, more megalopolises and metropolises, fewer medium-sized and small cities. The most distinguishing feature of urban population growth was the remarkable increase of population in megalopolises and metropolises. The key reason for urban population expansion is to want to obtain the benefits of scale-agglomeration economy of metropolises. The number of urban functions directly determines the quality and quantity of urban population. Metropolises appeal not only agricultural population but also the population of medium-sized and small cities, which put much more population pressure on metropolises. The ideal goals of scale-control of metropolitan population are discussed in terms of economy, society and ecollogy. In order to control the metropolitan population expansion, the following measures should be taken: developing medium-sized and small cities, and satillite cities establishing rationally regional urban system, reasonably distributing industrial enterprises, and greatly developing township enterprises.     

Developing China’s National Emission Trading Scheme: Experiences from Existing Global Schemes and China’s Pilot Programs

Market-based emission trading schemes (ETSs) are widely used in the developed world to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions which are perceived as the source of global climate change. China, as the largest GHG emitter in the world, is committed to introducing an ETS to reduce emissions. Here we reviewed existing ETSs and sustainable energy policies worldwide as well as China’s pilot programs. These studies were conducted in order to propose recommendations for national initiatives and strategies to be implemented in China in relation to climate change adaptation and mitigation. It has been shown that setting emission caps in the context of a national emission intensity target is difficult. However, implementing reliable systems for measurement, reporting, and verification of emissions are essential. A two-level management system (by central and provincial governments) for carbon trading is beneficial to ensure uniform standards and compliance while maintaining flexibility. Persistent political support from, and effective coordination of, policies by the government are crucial. In addition, strengthening of institutional innovation, and the establishment of a national GHG emissions information system, are of equal importance. This vital information could provide a great opportunity for China to re-define its economic growth and take global leadership in combatting climate change.     

The status evaluation of the permafrost environment along the Chaida’er-Muli Railway in southern Qilian Mountains in northern Qinghai Province,China

Engineering construction has major influence on the permafrost environment.This paper analyzes the interaction between engineering construction and permafrost environment along the Chaidaer-Muli Railway(simply,CMR) based on the press-state-response(PSR) framework.The permafrost environmental system is divided into three subsystems,consisting of permafrost thermal stability,proneness to the freeze-thawing erosion and permafrost ecological fragility.Each subsystem considers its most important influencing factors.Catastrophe Progression Method(CPM) is applied to calculate the current environment condition along the railway.The result indicates that:(1) as far as the thermal stability is concerned,most sections along the CMR are mainly concentrated in rank Ⅲ(fair situation),and a few in Ⅱ(good situation) and Ⅳ(bad situation),respectively;(2) for the proneness tothe freeze-thawing erosion,the entire railway route falls largely in rank Ⅱ(good situation);(3) along the CMR,the ecological fragility of the permafrost environment is in rank Ⅱ(good situation),or slightly fragile;(4) overall,the permafrost environments along the CMR are in rank Ⅲ(fair situation) or Ⅱcondition(good situation).In general,the permafrost environment along the CMR is fair.It is mainly because a series of active measures of protecting permafrost were taken for stabilizing the CMR foundation soils.On the one hand,we should try our best to minimize the influences that engineering activities have exerted on ecology and environment,on the other hand,the positive measures have made improvements to prevent the permafrost environment from deterioration.     

Spatial interaction and network structure evolvement of cities in terms of China’s rail passenger flows

Cities separated in space are connected together by spatial interaction （SI） between them. But the studies focusing on the SI are relatively few in China mainly because of the scarcity of data. This paper deals with the SI in terms of rail passenger flows, which is an important aspect of the network structure of urban agglomeration. By using a data set consisting of rail O-D （origin-destination） passenger flows among nearly 200 cities, inter-city rail distance O-D matrixes, and some other indices, it is found that the attenuating tendency of rail passenger is obvious. And by the analysis on dominant flows and spatial structure of flows, we find that passenger flows have a trend of polarizing to hubs while the linkages between hubs upgrade. However, the gravity model reveals an overall picture of convergence process over time which is not in our expectation of integration process in the framework of globalization and eco- nomic integration. Some driven factors for the re-organization process of the structure of urban agglomeration, such as technique advance, globalization, etc. are discussed further based on the results we obtained.     

Examination and Interpretation of the Quantitative Validity in China’s Corporate-based Urban Network Analysis

As a matter of expediency, most existing corporate-based urban networks can only be quantitatively measured by either counting the number of linkages or calculating the product of estimated service values. However, the impreciseness arising due to the limits of quantitative analysis may prove fatal to studies about non-market economies like China. Employing the capital investment dataset as an example, we build a capital-weighted intervention network as well as an unweighted control network to carry out an examination of the quantitative validity in China’s corporate-based urban network analysis. Both the overall spatial pattern and top city-dyads within the capital-weighted network witness Beijing, as the most dominant city, overshadow the performance of the others, and the unweighted network shows multilateral interactions between China’s top cities including Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, and Guangzhou. To further interpret the noticeable differences, we divide the overall network into two subnetworks, inferred by focusing on state-owned enterprises(SOEs) and private enterprises. The results show that the public and private sectors have separately created vastly different subnetworks in China and that SOEs play a much more significant role in terms of capital. Besides fresh insights into China’s urban network, this study provides a cautionary tale reminding researchers of the essentiality and complexity when making a quantitative distinction between different linkages.     

Measuring Tourist’s Water Footprint in a Mountain Destination of Northwest Yunnan, China

Monitoring and minimizing tourist’s water consumption is essential for the sustainable development of mountain destinations in the world. However, available data and a generally accepted protocol on such measurement are still limited. This study uses water footprint accounting to quantify tourist’s water demand in the Liming valley, a World Heritage site and a rapidly growing tourism destination in Northwest Yunnan, China. Both the water for direct and indirect use is taken into account based on the consump...     

Evaluation of role of Home Market Effects in China’s manufacturing industries

Under the theoretical framework of the New Trade Theory and the New Economic Geography, Home Market Effects (HMEs) is considered to be important sources of comparative advantage and significant reasons for industry agglomeration. Through the analysis on the input-output tables in China, the paper confirms the existence of HMEs for the manufacturing industries and their export trades on the national and provincial level in China. Several conclusions have been drawn in this study. Firstly, there exist prominent HMEs for manufacturing industries related with nondurable goods and materials in China. Secondly, 10 of the 15 kinds of manufacturing industries considered in this study display the existence of HMEs. Thirdly, the comparative advantage of factor endowment for the export trade of manufacturing industries is declining, while HMEs for them are increasing. Fourthly, among the 30 provincial regions studied in this paper, 11 regions show the existence of HMEs, most of which are located in the eastern coast region. This paper illustrates the simultaneous existence of the comparative advantage of factor endowment and scale economies of HMEs for China’s manufacturing industries. HMEs will not only be the new dynamic for the increase of manufacturing industries and their export trade, but also be the primary power for urban economic growth, industry improvement, and urban space expansion for China.     

Formation and syn-rifting process of the Wan’an Basin, South China Sea

Based on seismic and drilling data, we calculated tectonic subsidence amounts and rates of the Wan’an Basin by backstripping. The genetic mechanism and syn-rifting process of the basin were analyzed in combination with the regional geological setting. The results reveal that the basin syn-rifted in the Eocene and early Miocene under the control of the dextral strike-slip Wan’an Fault Zone. The transtensional/extentional stresses along this fault zone may be attributed to seafloor spreading of the South China Sea (SCS) in multiple episodes. Extensive basal faults and some small initial rifts in the early Paleogene can be related to southeastward extrusion and clockwise rotation of the Indochina Block. During the Oligocene, the nearly N-S directed spreading of the SCS derived the transtensional stresses in a roughly NW-SE orientation. The basin subsided rapidly in the middle and north to form two major subsidence centers. In the early Miocene, the SCS spread again in a nearly NW-SE direction, resulting in rapid subsidence in the southern basin continuous extending until the period ～16.3 Ma.     

Policy review and outlook on China’s sustainable development since 1992

The Road to Rio+20 is the journey of countries in the world pursuing the sustainable development.As the first country to release the national Agenda 21,China’s experience and lessons are of great significance for both China itself and other countries.The paper reviews the progress made and problems remained in pursuing the sustainable development in China with regard to policy formulation,institutional arrangements,planning and management.In the past five years,the mandatory targets-driven approach,which focused on energy efficiency and key pollutants reduction,played a very important role and made China comprehensive outcomes for sustainability.In order to achieve the targets,China adopted an integrated policy package including legal,administrative,economic and technology instruments.During the 12th Five-Year Plan period(2011-2015),China will continue and strengthen the approach above and mainstream the transformation of economic development pattern through realizing the idea of green and low-carbon development.By summarizing policy trends in the world,the paper points out two directions,i.e.,integration approach and taking prioritized and concrete actions for a sustainable future beyond 2012.The paper also presents policy approaches and recommendations for sustainable development in the next 10 years in China.     

Regional structure of capital market of foreign direct investment in China’s mainland

Since China’s reform and open-door, the countries and regions of direct investment in China’s mainland have been increasing. In 1995, the amount of foreign direct investment (FDI) in China was US$ 37.81 billion that was from more than 170 countries and regions. The regional structure of capital market of FDI in China has three characteristics: (1) The most of FDI was from the near countries or regions, Hong Kong-Macao, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, Thailand and Malaysia provided 80.3% of the amount of FDI in 1995. (2) Only several countries and regions provided most of FDI in China. (3) According to the contributory rate, the main capital market of FDI in China could be divided into four classes, including the guiding market, subsidiary market, new and development market, opportunity market. Most of FDI in China was from the developing countries and regions, which had a negative effect on the size and technical level of foreign capital enterprises. The author puts forward the countermeasures to improve the regional structure of capital market: (1) to keep the guiding market stable, (2) to open up chiefly the subsidiary market, (3) to guide actively the new and developing market, (4) to try hard to start the opportunity market.     

A Qualitative Appraisal of China’s Efforts in Fishing Capacity Management

I Introduction Many of the world’s commercially important fishstocks are overexploited and some are even depleted(FAO 1997, 2005). Overcapacity is considered to be amain factor leading to such a tragedy (FAO, 1999). Con-sequently, the existence of excess capacity has been sin-gled out by FAO (1995, 1998, 1999) as a matter of grow-ing concern over the last decades or so. This represents amajor shift in the fishery policy at the international level,from focusing almost exclusively on the is…     

The structures of eye and surrounding tissues of Longman＇ s beaked whale, Indopacetus pacificus

Observations were made on one eye from a Longman's beaked whale Indopacetus pacificus,which was probably one of the least known extant cetaceans.The whale died shortly after swimming aground on the coast in the Nishikata Beach,Sendai-shi,Kagoshima-ken Prefecture,Japan,on July 26,2002.It was a mature female with body length 6.45 m.This paper documented the basic structural characteristics of her visual organ of the whale in order to better understand this animal.     

Temporal changes in wetland plant communities with decades of cumulative water pollution in two plateau lakes in China’s Yunnan Province

Wetland plant communities in the plateau lakes of Yunnan Province, China, have decreased significantly over the past decades. To better understand this degradation, we analyzed the processes and characteristics of changes in wetland plant communities in two of the largest lakes in Yunnan Province, Dianchi and Erhai lakes. We collected records of native and alien plant communities in the two lakes from literature published from the 1950s to current period. We calculated plant community types and their area in some historical periods when related data were reported, and analyzed the relationship between changes in plant communities and water pollution. In Dianchi Lake, 12 community types of native plant communities, covering over 80% of the surface in the 1950s and 1960s, were reduced to four types covering 2.4% by the late 2000s. Alien plant communities started to appear in the lake in the late 1970s, and have since come to cover 4.9% of the lake surface, thereby becoming dominant. In Erhai Lake, 16 community types of native plant communities, covering 47.1% of the lake surface in the late 1970s, declined to 10 community types, covering 9.3% of the surface, by the late 2000s. Alien plant communities appeared in the middle 1980s, and at present cover 0.7% of the surface area. It was indicated that changes in plant communities were significant related to water eutrophication. The area occupied by native and alien plant communities was, respectively, negatively and positively related to the content of nutrients in water. This showed lacustrine pollution played an important role in native plant loss and alien plant invasion in the two plateau lakes.