Abstract:
Guangdong Province, a key forest region of southern China, was chosen as the case study area, monthly composite data of MODIS NDVI from 2000 to 2010, together with the global radiometric calibrated night light data of DMSP/OLS were gathered as the main source of information to calculate VFC, followed by the analysis of time series, spatial trend surface and driving factors. The results showed that during 2001 to 2010, annual average VFC in Guangdong Province fluctuated around a constant of 78.6%, but the overall trend presented a pattern of roughly unchanged. From the viewpoint of spatial pattern from high to low, VFC in Guangdong Province showed an strip distribution pattern of gradually decreasing from north to south. Annual average VFC was highly negatively correlated with annual precipitation day, weakly positively correlated with annual sunshine hours, not correlated with annual average temperature, annual average precipitation and light index.