In order to understand land use/land cover changes(LUCC) and the eco-environment response to LUCC in farming-pastoral zone of the northern China during the recent twenty years,Baotou prefecture was selected as a case study area for investigation and quantitative evaluation.Technologies of remote sensing(RS),global positioning system(GPS),geographic information system(GIS),and other statistical methods were employed to implement.Results showed that:(1) During the recent twenty years,the areas of forest lands,grasslands and water were reduced,whereas the areas of other types were enlarged.Parts of forest lands,grasslands,and waters had become farmlands,and about 31.5% of the changed grasslands transferred into unused lands.The newly increased farmlands mainly came from grasslands and unused lands.And the newly increased construction lands mainly came from grasslands and farmlands.(2) Regional eco-environmental quality decreased by 12.6%,for which the land degradation(especially the meadow degeneration) and the developing of the cultivated land were mainly responsible,and their contributions to the regional eco-environment changes were 51.84 and 23.63% respectively.(3) The tendency of LUCC and the eco-environment response to LUCC displayed spatial heterogeneity.It can be concluded that the present agricultural production mode was not sustainable in farming-pastoral zone of northern China.Land degradation,especially meadow degradation induced by over-trampling and overgrazing,and developing of cultivated land were mainly responsible for regional eco-environment deterioration.Changing the cultivated land to forest or grass,however,can relieve deterioration of local eco-environment to some extents.And in the farming-pastoral zone in the northern China,evaluating regional eco-environment responses to LUCC was very necessary due to its fragile eco-environments.
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