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Sustainable land use and management research: a scientometric review

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Abstract

Context

The study of sustainable land use reflects the interdisciplinary characteristics of land science, geography, ecology and sustainability science. In recent years, research on sustainable land use has rapidly increased in scope and speed around the world.

Objectives

To discuss the trends, research power distribution, key areas, research hotspots and international cooperation in sustainable land use research in the past 20 years.

Methods

This paper used the Bibliometrix and Biblioshiny software packages to entire process of bibliometric analysis and visual display of sustainable land use research papers from 1990 to 2019 (data update time is May 10, 2019).

Results

(1) The amount of publications in the field of sustainable land use from 1990 to 2019 increased with time and entered a period of rapid growth after 2013. (2) From the perspective of research power, the influence of developed countries in the field of sustainable land use is significantly stronger than that of developing countries. (3) Through high-frequency keyword analysis, land use change, land degradation, and sustainable land management are hotspots in the field of sustainable land use. (4) The themes of sustainable land use have changed greatly in various periods, and some of the themes have strong continuity.

Conclusions

In order to promote the development of sustainable land use, this paper proposes to integrate strong sustainability theory, landscape ecology theory, and geographical design concepts into this field, thereby greatly expanding the theoretical space. Also, this paper proposes to improve the scientificity of the evaluation indicators and use emerging technologies to timely monitor the status and evolution of land use, which can provide scientific basis and decision-making reference for the formulation of sustainable land use strategies, policies, and countermeasures.

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Acknowledgements

This study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 41930757 and 41971243); the Academic and Technical Leaders Funding Program for Major Disciplines in Jiangxi Province (No. 20172BCB22011); and the Fok Ying-Tung Fund (No. 141084).

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  1. Institute of Eco-Civilization, Jiangxi University of Finance and Economics, Nanchang, 330013, China

    Hualin Xie, Xiaoji Zeng & Yafen He

  2. School of Tourism and Urban Management, Jiangxi University of Finance and Economics, Nanchang, 330032, China

    Yanwei Zhang

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  1. Hualin Xie
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Xie, H., Zhang, Y., Zeng, X. et al. Sustainable land use and management research: a scientometric review. Landscape Ecol 35, 2381–2411 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10980-020-01002-y

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