Chinese cropping systems are a net source of greenhouse gases despite soil carbon sequestration

This work was funded by National Basic Research Program of China (2014CB953800), Young Talents Projects of the Institute of Urban Environment, Chinese Academy of Sciences (IUEMS201402), National Natural Science Foundation of China (41471190, 41301237, 71704171), China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (2014T70144) and Discovery Early Career Researcher Award of the Australian Research Council (DE170100423). The work contributes to the UK-China Virtual Joint Centres on Nitrogen “N-Circle” and “CINAg” funded by the Newton Fund via UK BBSRC/NERC (grants BB/N013484/1 and BB/N013468/1, respectively).Peer reviewedPostprintPostprin

The stock market in China: An endogenous adjustment process responding to the demands of economic reform and growth

Evaluations of China's stock market range from extremely favourable assessments that emphasise GDP growth rates, financial depth or the rapid growth of privatisation to extremely negative assessments that favour market efficiency or short-term profitability to the exclusion of alternative interpretations. This paper investigates the stock market performance in China through an overview of the rationale and events underpinning its development and by exploring the hypothesis that the co-evolution of stock market alongside financial development is in no way limited to attaining market efficiency. The paper argues that China's stock market, which is mainly accessible to large state-owned enterprises (SOEs), can be seen as adaptive and effective if its emergence and rapid development are understood as an endogenous adjustment process of financial development in response to both the demands of economic growth and changes in political constraints. The findings of this study present a conceptual model of China's stock market efficiency that takes into account the country's idiosyncratic social, economic and political environments. The paper contributes to the literature by offering a holistic view of the role of historical developments, policy initiatives, investors' behaviour and the economic aspirations of China as they pertain to stock market efficiency.Chinese stock market Financial development Economic reform Economic growth Market efficiency

A multi-dimensional integrated approach to assess flood risks on a coastal city, induced by sea-level rise and storm tides

Coastal cities are vulnerable to increasing flood risks caused by the combination of sea-level rise (SLR) and storm tides (STs), due to their low-lying topography and densely distributed assets. Faced with this challenge, comprehensive and integrated flood risk information is vital and fundamental for the planning, implementation and optimization of coastal risk adaptation and management. The goal of this study is to propose an integrated assessment approach to sea-level rise- and storm tide-induced flood risks on a coastal urban system by employing a wide range of indicators across ecological, physical and socio-economic dimensions. To demonstrate its applicability, a case study of Xiamen City, China was performed. The results show that this approach is applicable for assessing the specific flood risks on urban ecological, physical and socio-economic system, respectively. Under 4.75 ∼ 5.86 m extreme sea-level, 11 600 ∼ 17 100 ha land and 440 000 ∼ 720 000 population will be flooded in Xiamen City, with flood risks—measured by monetary—of 858 ∼ 1134 million, 4744 ∼ 10 590 million and 2537 ∼ 4175 million RMB of ecological, physical and economic systems, respectively. Coastal ecosystem will suffer flood risks on ecological services, mainly regulation service; and wetland is the dominant ecosystem that will be affected, which imply urgent needs to wetland conservation. Indirect risk on economy accounts for a large proportion of total risks, and should be given adequate weight in the decision-making process

Long-Term Dynamic of Land Reclamation and Its Impact on Coastal Flooding: A Case Study in Xiamen, China

While land reclaimed from the sea meets the land demand for coastal development, it simultaneously causes socio-economic systems to be prone to coastal flooding induced by storm surges and sea-level rise. Current studies have seldom linked reclamation with coastal flood impact assessment, hindering the provision of accurate information to support coastal flood risk management and adaptation. This study, using Xiamen, China as a case study, incorporates the spatiotemporal dynamics of reclamation into a coastal flood impact model, in order to investigate the long-term influence of reclamation activities on coastal flood inundation and the consequent exposure of the population to coastal flooding. We find that rapid population growth, continual economic development and urbanization drive a substantial logarithmic increase in coastal reclamation. Historical and future expansions of seaward land reclamation are found to cause dramatic surges in the expected annual inundation (EAI) and the expected annual population (EAP) exposed to coastal flooding. In Xiamen, EAI is estimated to increase by 440.2% from 1947 to 2035, owing to continuing land reclamation. Consequently, the population living in the flooded area has also increased sharply: the EAP of total population is estimated to rise from 0.8% in 1947 to 4.7% in 2035, where reclamation contributes over 80% of this increase. Moreover, a future 10 cm sea-level rise in 2035 will lead to extra 5.73% and 8.15% increases in EAI and EAP, respectively, and is expected to cause massive permanent submersion in the new reclamation zone. Our findings emphasize an integration of hard structures and nature-based solutions for building resilient coasts