1029 
Beijing 2008 
ECOSYSTEM HEALTH ASSESSMENT IN INNER MONGOLIA REGION BASED ON 
REMOTE SENSING AND GIS 
Yan Ding, Wen Wang*, Xiaoqian Cheng, Shuping Zhao 
School of Environment and Natural Resources, Renmin University of China, No. 59 Zhongguancun Street, Beijing 
100872, China 
secenes@ 163.com,wen_wang2000@hotmail.com, chengxqruc@ 163 .com, difengzsp@sina.com 
Commission I, ThS-1 
KEYWORDS: Ecosystem, GIS, Indicators, Analysis, Land Cover 
ABSTRACT: 
Ecosystem health is an important index of the regional sustainable development. In view of the singularity of indicator selection 
caused by the limited application of remote sensing and GIS at present, this paper took the Pressure-State-Response (PSR) model as 
reference, and revised the model in multi-analysis foundation. The pressure, vigor, organization structure, response and resilience 
were selected as the indicators of ecosystem health. This study distilled the vegetation index, image interpretation, change detection 
by remote sensing and GIS. The comprehensive assessment factors were developed with the integration of the social economic and 
demographic data, and some concepts of landscape ecology were introduced in this process. Finally, we analyzed the ecosystem 
health in Ordos area through ecosystem structure analysis, human footprint effect analysis, response analysis, resilience analysis, 
indicators extraction and system health assessment. 
1. INTRODCUTION 
Nowadays, with serious contamination and deterioration of 
global environment, regional ecosystem health has been 
concerned a lot and become an important index of regional 
sustainable development. The concept of ecosystem health was 
first developed as an ecological system which is healthy and 
free from ‘distress syndrome’ if it is stable and sustainable 
(Rapport, 1989; Rapport, 1999). And with the development of 
ecology, the concept of ecosystem health has been expanded to 
a comprehensive conception of ecology, economy and 
population. Rapport (Rapport, 1989; Rapport, 1999) considered 
ecosystem would include two parts: meeting the reasonable 
needs of humankind and maintaining the organization of itself. 
In this paper we propose a healthy ecosystem is the one that has 
the ability to maintain its structure (organization), function 
(vigor) and landscape level over time in the face of external 
stress (resilient) (Costanza, et al. 1999), also it is not threatening 
to the other surrounding ecosystem and could keep humankind 
and other organic coenosis healthy. 
At present, studies on ecosystem health mainly focus on the 
integration with other ecological theories, such as the 
assessment of regional ecosystem health using remote sensing 
and GIS. Based on remote sensing and GIS, the health 
assessment of grassland ecosystem (Chen, et al. 2005), lake 
ecosystem (Xu, et al. 2005), coastal ecosystem (Tamara, et at. 
2004), river ecosystem (Wu, et al. 2007), city ecosystem (Liu, et 
al. 2006) were developed. Presently, although the study of 
ecosystem health steps towards modeling and quantifying, there 
are some problems about establishment of assessment system, 
choice and singularity of evaluating indicators, which need to be 
further discussed. 
2. DATA USED 
2.1 Study area 
In this paper, the Ordos city, Inner Mongolia, China, was used 
for the study. The area studied is 106°42'40"E-111°27'20"E 
longitude by 37°35'24'7M- 40°51'40"N latitude. Ordos has an 
area of 86,752 km 2 and covers the bigger part of the Ordos 
plateau. The area of Ordos city can roughly be divided into a 
hilly area in the east, high plateaus in the west and center, sandy 
deserts in the north and south and the plains at the southern 
bank of the Yellow river. The highest elevation (2,149m) is 
located in the west, the lowest point (850m) in the east. The 
annual rainfall is 300-400mm in the eastern part and 190-350 
mm in the western part. Most of the rain falls between July and 
September. The ecosystem in this area is healthy or not means a 
lot to the whole north region of China. 
2.2 Data Source 
The data used in this study includes MODIS/Aqua vegetation 
index 16days 250m products from July 2001 to July 2005 
provided by NASA, 1:250,000 land use map of 2005, 1:250,000 
contour map, 1:250,000 vector graph of river and road, 
distribution of grassland pattern, local precipitation and 
evaporation data in 2004 and 2005, demographic and GDP data 
in 2004 and 2005. And DEM data could be extracted from 
contour map through ArcGIS spatial analysis tool. 
2.3 Selection of the assessment units 
The assessment units of ecosystem include administrative 
region unit, watershed unit, landscape unit and grid unit. In 
view of one watershed unit, the consistence in climate, 
hydrology and terrain means much to the regional ecosystem 
* Correspondence Author: Wen Wang. Address: School of Environment and Natural Resources, Renmin University of China, No.59 
Zhongguancun Street, Beijing 100872, China. Email: wen_wang2000@hotmail.com, Phone: 86-10-64870453