Coordinated development of a coupled social economy and resource environment system: a case study in Henan Province, China

At present, social economic development is undergoing severe stress with far-reaching impacts for the resource environment throughout the world. Based on the concept of coordination, the interaction between the social economic and resource environment can be modeled by a coupling coordination degree model. Using this method, we evaluated the social economic index and resource environment index based on an improved catastrophe progression model. Panel data comprising 21 factors were collected from 2001, 2004, 2007, 2010, and 2013 for 18 cities in Henan, China, and used to analyze developmental progress. The coupling coordination degree was also studied using the exploratory spatial data analysis technique and rescaled range analysis, which explained the patterns in spatial variation and its future trends. The results showed are as follows: (1) Social economic development and resource environment status exhibited an increasing trend. Cities were classified into four categories according to their average evaluation ranking in terms of social economic and the resource environment subsystem. (2) The coupling coordination class changed from slight disorder depression to moderate coordinated development, which reflected the optimization of internal subsystems. (3) An approximately inverted U-shaped curve was obtained for the coupling coordination degree in both the east–west and north–south directions. The overall spatial pattern in Henan was “middle high and low in surrounding areas.” (4) In the future, the extent of coordination is expected to increase continuously. Thus, Henan should focus on green development, accelerate the establishment of a resource-saving and environmentally friendly society, promote sustainable economic development, and facilitate the sustainable utilization of the resource environment.