Optimization of County-Level Land Resource Allocation through the Improvement of Allocation Efficiency from the Perspective of Sustainable Development

Land resources provide stable support for economic development in China. However, due to the scarcity of land, the contradiction between agricultural land protection and construction land expansion is prominent. Under such circumstances, optimal allocation of land resources between agricultural and nonagricultural uses is vitally important. In view of the fact that land resources are indispensable inputs for production activities in agricultural and nonagricultural sectors, reducing the efficiency loss of land resource allocation between agricultural and nonagricultural uses is the only way to optimize the process. Counties are the basic administrative units in China, and their improvement of allocation efficiency will help optimize nationwide land resource allocation. This paper constructs models for estimating county-level land resource allocation efficiency from the perspective of sustainable development and searches for countermeasures to improve allocation efficiency. W County is used as an example to demonstrate how to choose these targeted countermeasures. It is concluded that the best way to optimize county-level land resource allocation between agricultural and nonagricultural uses can be found by estimating allocation efficiency from the perspective of sustainable development.

Role of carbon allocation efficiency in the temperature dependence of autotroph growth rates

Relating the temperature dependence of photosynthetic biomass production to underlying metabolic rates in autotrophs is crucial for predicting the effects of climatic temperature fluctuations on the carbon balance of ecosystems. We present a mathematical model that links thermal performance curves (TPCs) of photosynthesis, respiration, and carbon allocation efficiency to the exponential growth rate of a population of photosynthetic autotroph cells. Using experiments with the green alga, Chlorella vulgaris, we apply the model to show that the temperature dependence of carbon allocation efficiency is key to understanding responses of growth rates to warming at both ecological and longer-term evolutionary timescales. Finally, we assemble a dataset of multiple terrestrial and aquatic autotroph species to show that the effects of temperature-dependent carbon allocation efficiency on potential growth rate TPCs are expected to be consistent across taxa. In particular, both the thermal sensitivity and the optimal temperature of growth rates are expected to change significantly due to temperature dependence of carbon allocation efficiency alone. Our study provides a foundation for understanding how the temperature dependence of carbon allocation determines how population growth rates respond to temperature.