Reconstruction and Drivers of Change in Historical Land Use Intensity in China: A Review and Prospect

Reconstructing historical land use intensity and analyzing its driving forces are crucial for understanding the impacts of human activities on the environment. This review systematically assesses the research on reconstructing historical land use intensity in China, focusing on four dimensions: land use type, harvest frequency, input intensity, and output intensity. The analysis reveals significant imbalances in the development of these dimensions, with reconstruction methods for land use types being the most mature, while quantitative methods for input intensity remain the weakest. The approaches are generally evolving from qualitative to quantitative analysis. Furthermore, studies on the driving forces behind intensity changes are predominantly qualitative, lacking integrated quantitative analyses of multiple factors. To overcome these limitations, the paper proposes that future research should integrate multi-source proxy indicators to construct a comprehensive, multi-dimensional assessment system. This would enable the spatiotemporal reconstruction of land use intensity and facilitate quantitative analysis of its driving forces using spatial data analysis and machine learning methods.