Rapid urbanisation, ecological effects andsustainable city construction in Xiamen

摘要

The year 2008 marked one of the most important stages inmankind’s development. For the first time in history, morethan half of the world’s human population lives in urbanareas (UNPF 2008), which means that the world has nowentered the urban society age. Rapid industrialisation andurbanisation requires the initiation and promotion of scienceor study of the urban environment, to find a way to integrateor couple urban development and eco-environment processesfor sustainable cities (Zhao et al. 2008). A sustainablecity, in general, is a city that supplies sustainable welfare toits people, with the capacity to maintain and improve itsecosystem services (Zhao et al. 2009). We have takenXiamen City as a case study to examine how a sustainablecity can be constructed.