Linking people, pixels, and pastures: A multi-method, interdisciplinary investigation of how rangeland management affects vegetation on the Tibetan Plateau

Studies of rangeland cover changes on the Tibetan Plateau have generally not taken pasture management into account beyond grazing pressure proxies. To address this gap we conducted a study in Qinghai Province, China that brings together results from four years of systematic vegetation sampling (2009–2012) with qualitative interview data and a time series of satellite imagery (1990–2010) to analyze the extent to which herders judged to have different levels of skill were able to manage for rangeland production over time. Our analysis demonstrated that NDVI-derived production estimates may have limited utility given their inability to distinguish between palatable and unpalatable vegetation. The analysis suggested that less skilled herders were less able to improve the productivity of their pastures over time relative to more skilled managers, but management was less significant than other environmental variables. At the same time, non-environmental factors weighed strongly in how households managed their land and livestock. The study illustrates some of the challenges of integrating social science, remotely sensed, and biophysical data, particularly in terms of the scale at which different types of data are collected and the nature of extensive pastoralism. Nevertheless linking people, pastures and pixels provides a more nuanced and complex understanding of human-environment relations on the Tibetan Plateau than reflected in current policy.