毕庆亭 et al. (2026) Decoding spatiotemporal changes in carbon-water coupling and their drought response in China’s tea ecosystems since the early 21st century

Identification

• Journal: Agricultural Water Management
• Year: 2026
• Date: 2026-06-16
• Authors: 毕庆亭, Yu Zeng, Canhui Wang, T F Li, Wenjing Chen, Li Zheng, X M Li, Yixu Li, Tao Chen
• DOI: 10.1016/j.agwat.2026.110542

Research Groups

• Department of Agricultural Resources and Environment, College of Agriculture, Guizhou University
• Surveying and Mapping Geographic Information Center, Sichuan Institute of Geological Survey

Short Summary

This study investigates the spatiotemporal dynamics of water use efficiency (WUEeco) in China's tea ecosystems from 2000 to 2023. The results reveal a significant increasing trend of WUEeco across the entire study area, but approximately 32.5% of tea plantation areas are projected to experience declining WUEeco trends in the future.

Objective

• Investigate the spatiotemporal dynamics of water use efficiency (WUEeco) in China's tea ecosystems from 2000 to 2023.
• Analyze the response of tea ecosystem WUEeco to variations in drought since the early 21st century.

Study Configuration

• Spatial Scale: National scale, covering the entire tea cultivation area in China (~3.23 million hectares).
• Temporal Scale: 24-year period from 2000 to 2023.

Methodology and Data

• Models used: Global Land Surface Satellite (GLASS) and Penman-Monteith-Leuning (PML) GPP and ETc act products.
• Data sources: Remotely sensed data, including GLASS and PML datasets, as well as SPEI data from the global gridded SPEI base product.

Main Results

• The mean annual WUEeco of China's tea ecosystems is 2.34 g C/kg H2O, exhibiting a significant increasing trend of 0.012 g C/kg H2O year−1 (p < 0.05).
• Approximately 32.5% of tea plantation areas are projected to experience declining WUEeco trends in the future.
• WUEeco showed a significant positive correlation with SPEI, implying that WUEeco decreased as drought intensified.

Contributions

• This study presents the first national-scale assessment of WUEeco across China's tea ecosystems and provides novel insights into its spatiotemporal characteristics across such a large region.
• The findings highlight the urgent need to develop targeted water management strategies to prevent and mitigate the serious threats posed by droughts to tea plantations.

Funding

• This research was funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 52179018) and the Guizhou University Research Fund (Grant No. GZU201901).

Citation

@article{毕庆亭2026Decoding,
  author = {毕庆亭 and Zeng, Yu and Wang, Canhui and Li, T F and Chen, Wenjing and Zheng, Li and Shen, Qixin and Li, X M and Li, Yixu and Chen, Tao},
  title = {Decoding spatiotemporal changes in carbon-water coupling and their drought response in China’s tea ecosystems since the early 21st century},
  journal = {Agricultural Water Management},
  year = {2026},
  doi = {10.1016/j.agwat.2026.110542},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agwat.2026.110542}
}