Evolution of the southern Mu Us Desert in north China over the past 50 years: An analysis using proxies of human activity and climate parameters

Many previous studies have attributed the degradation in the Mu Us Desert in China to many centuries of human activity. The present study includes analysis of proxies of human activity such as arable land area, population and livestock number, and variations of precipitation, evaporation, temperature, sand-driving wind and dust events, covering the period since 1950. It is demonstrated that desertification and vegetation rehabilitation during this period were principally related to the climatic variation, especially correlated to sand-driving winds. It also suggests that the desert evolution in the past 2000 years was controlled by climate change rather than human activity. Although human activity was significant in the desert evolution processes over the past 50 years, the impacts seems to be overestimated in previous studies. Desertification and desert evolution in the Mu Us Desert are mainly in response to climatic trends and fluctuations. Copyright (c) 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.