ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Environ. Sci.
Sec. Ecosystem Restoration
This article is part of the Research TopicDynamics of Land Use Change: Ecological Conservation, Restoration Strategies, and Carbon BalanceView all 5 articles
Strategic Zoning for Ecological Security Risk in Mountainous National Parks: A Case from Central China
Provisionally accepted
- Hunan Normal University, Changsha, China
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Scientific strategic zoning for ecological security risk have become key factors in enhancing the ecological management of national parks. Existing studies often lack integrated analyses of the multidimensional functions of ecosystems, and the connection between ecological zoning strategies and practical management needs remains weak. Accordingly, this study uses Shennongjia National Park as a representative case to develop an ecological security pattern (ESP) framework grounded in the integrated analysis of ecological importance, ecological sensitivity, and spatial resistance. In conclusion, ecological security in Shennongjia is highly heterogeneous, and connectivity bottlenecks and fracture points concentrate the most actionable vulnerabilities. The proposed source–corridor– node ESP enables strategic zoning that prioritizes core sources, protects key corridors, and targets barrier mitigation where connectivity is most at risk, offering a replicable decision-support tool for mountainous national parks. Thus, the study enriches the analytical framework for ecological security in national parks; practically, it offers technical pathways and management insights for strategic ecological zoning, risk identification, and ecological restoration in mountainous parks. These findings are of great significance for addressing ecological security challenges under climate change and for advancing the modernization of ecological spatial governance systems. Then, this study advances ESP research for mountainous national parks by coupling ecosystem-service-based ecological importance with terrain-and land-cover-driven ecological sensitivity to form an integrated ecological security assessment, and by translating the assessment into a management-oriented "source–corridor–node" ecological security pattern using a resistance surface and MCR-based connectivity analysis. By further identifying ecological fracture points, the framework supports strategic zoning and restoration prioritization that are directly actionable for national park governance under increasing climate and anthropogenic uncertainties.
Keywords: ecological restoration, Ecological security pattern, Security risk, Shennongjia national park, Strategic zoning
Received: 02 Nov 2025; Accepted: 28 Jan 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 Zheng, Liu, Hu, Chen and Xu. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Xin Long Xu
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