Introduction

Since the 1980s, China had entered a period of rapid economic development, but a series of development disadvantages had also followed, such as population explosion, uneven economic development, resource shortage, environmental degradation, and other environmental problems (Peng and Guo 2018). At the same time, as a developing country with rapid urbanization and the largest energy consumption, the serious imbalance of population, economy, and resource development had brought great challenges to the sustainable development of China (Lv et al. 2018; Johnston et al. 2007). The natural resource stock and ecological environment capacity of a region determined its population-carrying capacity during a period, and there was a limit to the carrying capacity. Within this limit, human development and ecological environment resources are sustainable (Sun and Liu 2014). However, once the total population exceeds population-carrying capacity of this region, it will inevitably lead to the imbalance between human development and ecological and environmental protection of resources, and even cause ecological crisis, which seriously threatens local sustainable development (Yang et al. 2001).

Broadly speaking, fast-growing population, growing business activities, industrialization, and inadequate provision of waste management services had led to a growth in the amount of wastes discharged into the environment (Juma et al. 2014). Resource depletion and environmental pollution posed a threat to the stability and sustainability of the ecological system. With mightily approving of sustainable conception by a large number of people, protecting resources and environment had aroused people’s attentions from all walks of life, and they were also beginning to be aware of the significance of co-development of resources, environment, economy, and society (Wei and Liu 2013). In recent decades, scholars had carried out a lot of researches on resource-carrying capacity, but these researches had some defects: (1) Understanding about resources was circumscribed. Up to now, studies on resource carrying capacity mainly focused on land, water, and key mineral resources. By nature, resources should be the sum of natural and social resources. Also, with the progress of science and technology, and the gradual integration of the global economy, people’s living and production within a certain area would become less and less dependent on existing natural resources in this region. Traditional researches on resource-carrying capacity, which took food consumption that met a certain standard of living as the standard of population-carrying capacity, had great limitations. And the higher level requirements such as culture, education, and entertainment needs should also be taken into account in the quality of life standards pursued by human beings. Even from the perspective of some people, for example, the worldwide carrying capacity for mankind had already been, or would be, exceeded in some regions, such as food consumption or fossil fuel use (Paul et al. 2007). Therefore, the extension of resource carrying capacity should be expanded. (2) Dynamic viewpoints were scanty. Traditional studies on resource-carrying capacity only used current living conditions and living standards to estimate current and future resource-carrying capacity. With the development of economy and society, contemporary scholars generally agreed that resource-carrying capacity should be a dynamic concept. (3) Research areas were regarded as closed and isolated systems (Wang 2009). Traditional researches on resource-carrying capacity isolated research areas and took food resources as the only restraint factor of population carrying capacity, thus coming to the one-sided conclusion that the total regional grain output fundamentally determined the population support level in this area. At present, each region was no longer an independent and closed system, and the relationship with the outside world was getting closer and closer. Compared with surrounding areas, the research area was an open and dynamic areal system. There were more and more resource circulation and exchange inside and outside the region, and the mutual dependence and complementarity in resources were getting stronger and stronger (Liang et al. 2018; Pei and Wang 2017).

Therefore, resource-carrying capacity should be studied from the perspective of globalization (Pan and Han 2007). To avoid the above defects, some scholars put forward the research strategy of relative resource-carrying capacity according to per-capital resource ownership and consumption in the reference area as well as the resource stock in the study area, which meant that one or more reference areas larger than the specific research area were selected as comparison criteria to calculate each kind of relative resource-carrying capacity in the study area. Research ideas and methods of relative resource carrying capacity had been applied in the evaluation model of regional sustainable development and the study of the relationship between population distribution and resources (Bao and Cui 2005).

As China was populous and total resources were limited, the total population calculated by conventional methods almost always carried less people than they actually did (Huang and He 2011). In quest of seeking the important path of industrial transformation and upgrading, and achieving the harmonious development of population, resources, and environment, this study expanded the relative resource-carrying capacity model on the basis of the existing resource-carrying capacity framework. The natural resource subsystem contained three indicators: water resources, land resources, and energy resources, while the analysis category that belonged to the social resource subsystem contained the population quality factor. Based on the improved model, this study analyzed the relative resource-carrying capacity state of Guiyang city and revealed the mutual relationship and evolution rule of population, resources, and environment in Guiyang city. This not only provided a reference for Guiyang city to achieve sustainable development but also had theoretical and realistic meanings for enriching and expanding the research background of relative resource-carrying capacity, and also probing into the sustainable development of other man-earth relationships (Yang and Ding 2018).

Literature review

With the continuous emergence of ecological environment problems and the concept of resource environment carrying capacity becoming more and more mature, researches on its theory and evaluation methods had been deepened. It can be seen from the point of existence and development of human beings that resource-carrying capacity took the relationship between resources, environment, and ecology into consideration (Seidl and Tisdell 1999). During the process of researches on human ecology, the concept of carrying capacity was formally proposed by Park and Burgess (Park and Burgess 1920), which referred to the maxim limit of the quantity of individual existence in a certain environmental condition. In the book “The Limits to the Growth,” for the worldwide resources (land, water, food, mining, etc.), the relationship between the ecological environment and people was evaluated by using the system dynamics theory, and the relationship among population growth, economic development, excessive consumption of resources, ecological environment deterioration, and limited food production was revealed, thereby reaching the conclusion that in the middle of the twenty-first century, the global economic growth would reach the limit (Arrow et al. 1995). On the basis of the seniors’ researches, scholars in China had carried out a great number of studies on the evaluation of resource and environment carrying capacity. Zeng and Wang took the lead in carrying out a quantitative research on the environmental carrying capacity. They established the functional relationship between development variables (measuring human activities) and limiting variables (measuring environmental constraints) and conducted a case study on the environmental carrying capacity of planned communities in Meizhou bay development zone, Fujian province (Zeng et al. 1991). Mao and Yu used the state space method to evaluate environmental carrying capacity of the Bohai rim region quantitatively (Mao and Yu 2001). Liu and Wang selected dozens of indicators from the following four aspects, including economy, society, resource environment, and ecological system, to construct the evaluation index system of environmental resource-carrying capacity and adopted the residual rate method for research (Liu et al. 2006). Fu and Ma constructed the evaluation index system of urban resource and environmental carrying capacity from the aspects of social resources and natural resources and conducted an empirical study on the resource and environmental carrying capacities of 15 sub-provincial cities from 2003 to 2013 by using the principal component analysis method (Fu and Ma 2016). Dai and Sun used the water ecological footprint model combined with the system dynamic model to assess the water resource carrying capacity and its sustainability in Zhangjiakou City, a typical water shortage city in north China (Dai et al. 2019).

While at the same time, foreign scholars had also carried out researches on evaluations of resource and environment-carrying capacity. Millnigtno and Gifford adopted the multi-objective decision-making method to have the capacity of land resources measured in Australia (Millington and Gifford, 1973). Bishop performed related researches on the environmental carrying capacity (Bishop et al. 1974), and Holling carried out relevant researches on the ecological carrying capacity (Holling 1986). Fiala N discussed how a footprint can specify the current sustainability of a system by arbitrarily determining boundaries (Fiala 2008). Rees presented a calculation of the city of Vancouver, Canada, which he argued required 174 times as much land to sustain it as is currently contained within the city (Rees 2008). Slesser proposed the ECCO model (Enhancement of Carrying Capacity Options) as a calculation method for new resource and environmental carrying capacity (Slesser 1990). Outeiro performed a review of ecosystem ecology indicators to compare relative carrying capacities in Ria de Arousa (NW Spain) (Outeiro et al. 2018). Ait-Aoudia M N assessed water resource carrying capacity of Algeria’s capital city (Ait-Aoudia and Berezowska-Azzag 2016). Gober Patricia studied a simulation model for urban water planning in Phoenix, Arizona, USA (Gober et al., 2011). Naimi-Ait-Aoudia M assessed the water-carrying capacity in Algiers internationally admitted levels of household consumption and took into account water inputs that can significantly vary according to dry and wet years (Naimi-Ait-Aoudia and Berezowska-Azzag 2014). Oh, K calculated the carrying capacity by an integrated framework for assessing urban carrying capacity which can determine development density based on current infrastructures and land use for an area in Seoul, South Korea (Oh et al., 2005). Hasan Rüstemoğlu made a comprehensive environmental analysis on the factors affecting Germany’s green development from 1990 to 2015 (Rüstemoğlu 2019). From the above discussion, it can be seen clearly that researches on resource carrying capacity had developed from single dimension to multi-dimension.

Traditional carrying capacity analysis, which was mostly in a single, closed, static environmental condition, was obtained by the calculation and evaluation of natural resources, emphasizing the strong dependence of human survival and development on natural resources (Liu et al. 1998). Sustainable development was a compound ecological system composed of three subsystems: nature, economy, and society. In a broad sense, resources included natural resources, economic resources, and social resources. Human beings were the main components of social subsystems and carrying objects in the carrying capacity (Liu and Yu 2002). The“P-E-R regional matching model” proposed by Mr. Zhu in 1993 (Zhu 1993) and the “relative resource carrying capacity” proposed by Mr. Huang in 2000 (Huang and Kuang 2000) were two classic research ideas and methods for evaluating regional population, economy, and resource-carrying capacity. Both of them were to study the relationship among population, economy, and resources from the perspective of regional sustainable development. However, the “P-E-R regional matching model” established by Mr. Zhu placed more emphasis on the matching relationship among population, economy, and resource-carrying capacity particularly from the perspective of regional population distribution. The calculation ideas and methods of relative resource carrying capacity put forward by Mr. Huang mainly focused on comparing the contribution of relative carrying capacity of land resources and relative carrying capacity of economic resources to comprehensive carrying capacity.

In terms of analytical method, relative resource-carrying capacity was based on a comparison of several reference areas larger than the study area in contrast to the traditional study of resource carrying capacity, which focused on the calculation of absolute amount of food (or grain). Then, relative carrying capacities of various resources in the study area relative to the reference area were calculated according to per-capita resource ownership and consumption in the reference area (Zhu 1993). Similar methods had been applied in the evaluation model of regional sustainable development and the study of the relationship between population distribution and resources (Jiang 1998; Wang and Liu 2003). Compared with the traditional single resource-carrying capacity, the relative resource-carrying capacity emphasized the openness of the research area and the complementarity between natural resources and economic resources (Huang and Kuang 2000).

However, there was little extensive research on the model, especially on the sustainable development. How to improve the population carrying capacity and promote and enhance the development of regional economic would be an important scientific issue to achieve the sustainable development of regional population, resources, environment, economy, and society. Under the influence of social factors such as enhancement of interregional communication, it was of great significance to study the reduction of human dependence on natural resources and the realization of the complementarity between natural resources and economic resources to improve population carrying capacity. Therefore, based on the traditional relative resource-carrying capacity, this study analyzed the improved relative resource-carrying capacity model and demonstrated the situation of Guiyang’s relative resource-carrying capacity from 2003 to 2017 with the improved model, to reveal the trends and characteristics of Guiyang’s resource-carrying capacity.

Data sources and research methods

The basic data in this study were mainly from China statistical yearbook (2003-2017), China urban statistical yearbook (2003-2017), China regional statistical yearbook (2003-2017), Guizhou statistical yearbook (2003-2017), Guiyang statistical yearbook (2003-2017), and the field data from 2003 to 2017.

According to the relative resource-carrying capacity (Wang and Zhang 2017), and natural ecological and geographical conditions of Guiyang city, the model was modified appropriately in this study. This study took water resources, cultivated areas, and energy resources as natural resource indicators. Industrial wastewater discharges were taken as environmental resource indicator. GDP was served as economic resource indicator. Social resource indicators were the total retail sales of social consumer goods, and high school and above education population:

$$ {C}_{rw le}={W}_1{C}_{rw}+{W}_2{C}_{rl}+{W}_3{C}_{re} $$
(1)

where Crwle is the relative natural resource-carrying capacity, which is the sum of three components: Crw, Crl, and Cre that represent the carrying capacity of water resources, the carrying capacity of cultivated area, and the carrying capacity of energy resources respectively.

$$ {C}_{rw}={I}_{rw}\times {Q}_{rw},\kern1.5em {C}_{rl}={I}_{rl}\times {Q}_{rl},\kern1.5em {C}_{re}={I}_{re}\times {Q}_{re} $$

Qrw is the total amount of water resources, Qrl is the total amount of cultivated area, and Qre is the total amount of energy resources in the study area. For the natural resource-carrying capacity index, the calculation formula is as follows: Irw = P0/Qrw0,  Irl = P0/Qrl0, Ire = P0/Qre0. Among them, Irw is the water resources-carrying index, Irl is the cultivated area carrying index, Ire is the energy resources carrying index. P0 is the total population of the reference area. Qrw0, Qrl0, and Qre0 are the total water resources, the cultivated area, and the total energy production in the reference area respectively. W1 is the weight of water resources in the relative natural resources carrying capacity, W2 is the weight of cultivated area in the relative natural resources carrying capacity, and W3 is the weight of energy resources in the relative natural resources-carrying capacity:

$$ {C}_{re1}={I}_{re1}\times {\mathrm{Q}}_{\mathrm{re}1} $$
(2)

where Cre1 means the relative environmental resource carrying capacity. Qre1 is the total amount of industrial wastewater discharged into the study area. Ire1 is the environmental resource-carrying index which has the following calculation formula: Ire1 = P0/Qre10, P0 is listed as above and Qre10 is the total industrial wastewater discharge of the reference area:

$$ {C}_{re2}={I}_{re2}\times {\mathrm{Q}}_{\mathrm{re}2} $$
(3)

where Cre2 means the relative economic resource-carrying capacity. Qre2 is the regional GDP of the research region. Ire2 is the economic resources-carrying index which has the following calculation formula: Ire2 = P0 × Qre20; P0 is listed as above and Qre20 is GDP of the reference area:

$$ {C}_{rs}={W}_4{C}_{rc}+{\mathrm{W}}_5{\mathrm{C}}_{\mathrm{rh}} $$
(4)

The above formula is to calculate the relative social resource-carrying capacity. In the formula, Crs means the relative social resource-carrying capacity that is the sum of Crc and Crh. Crc denotes social consumer goods resources and Crh denotes human capital resources. Crc = Irc × Qrc,  Crh = Irh × Qrh. Qrc is the social consumable total retail sales in the research area, Qrh is the number of people with a high school education or above in the research area. From the above two formulas, they can be calculated: Irc = P0/Qrc0,  Irh = P0/Qrh0. Among them, Irc is the social consumer goods resources-carrying index and Irh is human capital resources-carrying index. P0 is listed as above. Qrc0 is the social consumable total retail sales in the reference area and Qrh0 is the number of people with a high school education or above in the reference area. W4 is the weight of social consumer goods resources and W5 is the weight of human capital resources in relative social resources-carrying capacity:

$$ {C}_s={W}_6{C}_{rwle}+{W}_7{C}_{re1}+{W}_8{C}_{re2}+{W}_9{C}_{rs} $$
(5)

Among them, Cs means the relative comprehensive resource-carrying capacity. W6, W7, W8, and W9 are respectively the weights of natural resources, environmental resources, economic resources, and social resources in the relative carrying capacity on comprehensive resources. According to the specific situation of Guiyang city (Ni and Wang 2012; Li et al. 2016) and previous literatures (Dai et al. 2019; Noronha et al. 2019; Al-mulali et al. 2015), the weights could be set as: W1 = 0.4, W2 = W3 = 0.3, W4 = W5 = 0.5, W6 = W8 = 0.3, W7 = W9 = 0.2.

Evaluation methods of relative resource-carrying capacity mainly included the following three types: (1) When the actual population of the research area (P) is larger than the population that resources can support (Cs), that is P-Cs > 0, overload. (2) When the actual population of the research area (P) is less than the population that resources can support (Cs), that is, P-Cs < 0, surplus. (3) When the actual population of the research area (P) is equal to the population that resources can support (Cs), that is, P-Cs = 0, critical. The formula of overloading rate (or surplus rate) is R = P0/P. R is the relative resource overload rate (or surplus rate), and P0 is the actual overpopulation: P0 = P − Cs.

Results

Overview on the case city

Guiyang, the capital city of Guizhou province, is one of typical karst cities in southwest China. The location information is illustrated in Fig. 1 (Wang et al. 2019). The total urban area is 8034 km 2, which accounts for 4.56% of the province’s total area and the population was 4.69 million in 2018. Guiyang city is located in the eastern slope zone of Yunnan-Guizhou plateau in central Guizhou province, east longitude 106°07′-107°17′, north latitude 26°11′ to 27°22′. Guiyang is a typical area of karst geomorphology, and its unique geographical environment makes it a fragile region of ecologic environment. Karst area reaches 6803 km2, occupying 85% areas in total of Guiyang. Besides, the area of rocky desertification and potential rocky desertification reaches 51%, and the soil erosion is very severe. Guiyang is endowed with natural resources, with an annual total water resources of 4.68 billion cubic meters, theoretical reserves of 1.307 million kW of water resources, a forest coverage rate of 41.78%, a garden area of 9.26%, and a forest land of 34.01%.

Fig. 1
figure 1

Geographical information of Guiyang City in China

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Models comparison before and after improvement

For the traditional relative resource-carrying capacity model, regional GDP, cultivated area, industrial wastewater discharge, and social consumable total retail sales were seen as relative economic resource-carrying capacity, relative natural resource-carrying capacity, relative environmental resource-carrying capacity, and relative social resource-carrying capacity, respectively. While for the improved relative resource carrying capacity model, water and energy resources were included in relative natural resource carrying-capacity, and human capital resources were incorporated into relative social resource-carrying capacity. Analysis results before and after model improvement showed that (Table 1 and Table 2) on the basis of analyzing the traditional relative resource-carrying capacity model and taking the whole country as the reference area, relative resource comprehensive-carrying capacity of Guiyang had been in a state of overload, with an average overload population of 1 million from 2003 to 2017, while taking Guizhou province as the reference area, the relative resource comprehensive-carrying capacity of Guiyang had been in a state of surplus, with an average surplus population of 3 million from 2003 to 2017. Relative resource comprehensive-carrying capacity of Guiyang was also in an overload state on the basis of analyzing the improved model when taking the whole country as the reference area, but the average overload population was about 0.8 million. While the relative resource comprehensive-carrying capacity of Guiyang was in a surplus state on the basis of analyzing the improved model when taking the entire province as the reference area, and the average surplus population was also about 3 million. When taking the whole country as the reference area, whether based on the traditional model analysis or the improved model analysis, relative resource overload ratio had the same trend, they had been positive, and their numerical values showed a trend of increasing first and then decreasing. When taking the entire province as the reference area, whether based on the traditional model analysis or the improved model analysis, relative resource surplus ratio had the same trend, they had been negative, and their absolute values showed a trend of decreasing first and then increasing. Furthermore, there were some differences between the two models, indicating that the contribution rate of energy resources to natural resources was high, and the contribution rate of human capital resources to social resources was low. Hence, when analyzing the carrying capacity of regional resources, advantages and disadvantages of resources should be considered properly. Or else, population-carrying capacity calculated by the models would change greatly, which would have a negative impact on the understanding of sustainable development in the study area.

Table 1 Comparison of comprehensive resource carrying capacity in Guiyang from 2003 to 2017, taking the whole country as the reference area
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Table 2 Comparison of comprehensive resource carrying capacity in Guiyang from 2003 to 2017, taking Guizhou province as the reference area
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Taking the whole country and the entire province as reference areas respectively to analyze the improved model

Relative comprehensive resource-carrying capacity

From Table 3 and Fig. 2, it can be seen that when taking the whole country as the reference area, relative comprehensive resource-carrying capacity of Guiyang was in an overload status from 2003 to 2017, and the size of overload population showed a trend of increasing first and then decreasing. Overall, relative comprehensive resource-carrying capacity of Guiyang was still in overload status when taking the whole country as the reference area. The average comprehensive resource-carrying capacity was 3 million people, and the overload rate and overload scale had been decreasing in recent years. In Table 3, the overload scale decreased from 1.65 million people at the highest level in 2011 to 0.36 million people in 2017, which meant that with the development of social economy and population increase, relative comprehensive resource-carrying capacity in Guiyang gradually increased.

Table 3 Relative resource-carrying capacity of Guiyan from 2003 to 2017, taking the whole country as the reference area
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Fig. 2
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Each kind of relative resource-carrying capacity of Guiyang, taking the whole country as the reference area

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From Table 4 and Fig. 3, it can be seen that when taking the entire province as the reference area, relative comprehensive resource-carrying capacity of Guiyang was in an surplus state from 2003 to 2017, and the absolute surplus population size showed a trend of decreasing first and then increasing. Overall, the relative comprehensive resource-carrying capacity of Guiyang City was still in surplus state when taking the entire province as the reference area. The average comprehensive resource-carrying capacity was 7 million people, and the absolute surplus rate and surplus scale had been increasing in recent years. In Table 4, the surplus scale decreased from 5 million people at the highest level in 2003 to 1 million people in 2011, then it increased to 2.36 million in 2017, which meant that with the development of social economy and population increase, relative comprehensive resource-carrying capacity in Guiyang gradually increased.

Table 4 Relative resource-carrying capacity of Guiyang from 2003 to 2017, taking the entire province as the reference area
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Fig. 3
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Each kind of relative resource carrying capacity of Guiyang, taking the entire province as the reference area

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Average contribution rate of each resource-carrying capacity to population-carrying capacity

From Fig. 4, it can be seen that when taking the whole country as the reference area, carrying capacities of economic and social resources accounted most for population-carrying capacity in Guiyang, while carrying capacities of natural and environmental resources were always overload from 2003 to 2017. Carrying capacities of environmental resources and natural resources were both lower than the actual population while carrying capacities of economic resources and social resources were both higher than the actual population in Guiyang. During the period from 2003 to 2017, the contribution rate of natural resources-carrying capacity was basically below 21%, the contribution rate of environmental resources decreased first from 27% in 2003 to 10% in 2012, then increased to 19% in 2017. The average contribution rate of economic resources and the average contribution rate of social resources increased to 33.4% and 31.3% respectively. At the end of 2017, the carrying capacity of economic resources was 5944 thousand people, natural resources 3169 thousand people, environmental resources 3339 thousand people, and social resources 5159 thousand people. Among these four resource-carrying capacity indicators, natural and environmental resource-carrying capacities were always lower than the actual population-carrying capacity, and the other two kinds of resource carrying capacities were both higher than the actual population carrying capacity, which revealed that economic and social resources were main carriers of the social population. From 2003 to 2017, the relative carrying capacity of natural resources on the population had been stable at about 20%, and the relative carrying capacity of environmental resources on the population dropped first and then rose.

Fig. 4
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Evolution of relative resource-carrying capacity of Guiyang, taking the whole country as the reference area

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From Fig. 5, it can be seen that when taking the entire province as the reference area, carrying capacities of economic and social resources contributed the most stable for the population-carrying capacity, while natural resource-carrying capacity was always overload from 2003 to 2017, and the environmental resource-carrying capacity showed dramatic changes, which decreased first, then increased. The carrying capacity of natural resources was always lower than the actual population while carrying capacities of economic resources and social resources were both higher than the actual population, and environmental resource-carrying capacity was higher than the actual population most of the time except that the 5-year period (2011-2015) was below the actual population. During the period from 2003 to 2017, the contribution rate of natural resource-carrying capacity had been below 15%, and the contribution rate of relative environmental resources decreased first from 37% in 2003 to 13% in 2014, then increased to 31% in 2017. The average contribution rate of economic resources and the average contribution rate of social resources increased to 33.8% and 29.2% respectively. At the end of 2017, the carrying capacity of social resources was 7375 thousand people, economic resources 9341 thousand people, natural resources 3516 thousand people, and environmental resources 9171 thousand people. Among these four resource carrying capacity indicators, natural resource-carrying capacity had been always lower than the actual population-carrying capacity, the environmental resource-carrying capacity was higher than the actual population-carrying capacity most of the time, and the other two kinds of resource carrying capacities were both higher than the actual population carrying capacity, which revealed that economic and social resources were main carriers of the social population. From 2003 to 2017, the relative carrying capacity of natural resources on the population had been below at 15%, and the relative carrying capacity of environmental resources on the population dropped first and then rose.

Fig. 5
figure 5

Evolution of relative resource carrying capacity of Guiyang, taking the entire province as the reference area

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Development trend of natural resources and social resources

Whether the whole country or the entire province was taken as the reference area, natural resource-carrying capacity was both overloaded. When the whole country was taken as the reference area, it can be seen that energy resource-carrying capacity was the largest, followed by the carrying capacity of cultivated area, and the carrying capacity of water resource was the least. When the entire province was taken as the reference area, it can be seen that energy resource-carrying capacity was the largest, followed by the carrying capacity of cultivated area, and the carrying capacity of water resource was the least. In both reference area cases, energy resource-carrying capacity was relatively rich, much higher than the actual population, showing that energy resources had played an important role in the sustainable development. However, carrying capacities of water resources and cultivated area were obviously insufficient, especially the carrying capacity of water resources was well below the actual population, and they were always in deficit, indicating that water resources and cultivated area were main factors that restricted the sustainable development.

When it came to the social resource carrying capacity, the social resource carrying capacity had been in different state. When the whole country was taken as the reference area, it can be seen that the social resource-carrying capacity was in a state of overload from 2003 to 2013, the carrying capacity of social consumer goods resources was larger than the carrying capacity of human capital resources from 2003 to 2017. Carrying capacities of social consumable resources and human capital resources had been continuously increasing from 2003 to 2017, both of them were always lower than the actual population-carrying capacity from 2003 to 2013, and then larger than the actual population carrying capacity from 2014, showing that social consumable goods resources had played a crucial part in the sustainable development. When the entire province was taken as the reference area, it can be seen that social resource-carrying capacity was in a state of surplus from 2003 to 2017, and the carrying capacity of social consumer goods resources was larger than the carrying capacity of human capital resources from 2003 to 2017. The carrying capacity of social consumable resources had been stable from 2003 to 2017, while the carrying capacity of human capital resources showed a declining trend from 2003 to 2007 and was lower than the actual population-carrying capacity from 2010 onwards, showing that social consumable goods resources had played a crucial part in the sustainable development, human capital resources in Guiyang had been lost.

Relative resource-carrying capacities of each city, county, and district in Guiyang

Local natural conditions and resources had played an important and positive role in the whole session of regional economic development. Taking Guizhou province as the reference area, relative resource-carrying capacity states of a total of one city, six districts, and three counties in Guiyang were calculated from 2003 to 2017 (Table 5).

Table 5 The overloading/surplus state of relative resource carrying capacity of each city, county, and district in Guiyang, taking Guizhou province as the reference area
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From Table 5, it can be seen that other districts and counties were in the state of surplus, except that Qingzhen was overloaded after 2010 and Xiuwen was overloaded in 2010, 2011, and 2012. According to calculation results, the surplus state of urban districts and counties could be divided into three groups: the first group was Yunyan district, Nanming district, and Huaxi district with a surplus of more than 0.2 million people, which formed the main city of Guiyang. These districts all had extreme surplus capacities because comprehensive-carrying capacity brought by the rapid economic development was far greater than the actual population-carrying capacity. Environmental resource-carrying capacity, economic resource-carrying capacity, and social resource carrying capacity of these districts were far higher than relative natural resource-carrying capacities, and natural resource-carrying capacity was in an overloaded status. This was very clear that natural resources of these three districts were the short board for the population-carrying capacity, and the government should provide policy guidance. It was necessary to take protection of water and land resources into consideration and increased energy efficiency while developing the economy, to lessen dependence on natural resources and improved natural resource-carrying capacity.

The second group was Baiyun district, Guanshanhu district, Wudang district, Kaiyang county, Xifeng county with a surplus of less than 0.1 million people after 2010, which are located in the suburbs of Guiyang. These districts all had slight surplus capacities because carrying capacities of natural resources and social resources in these districts were the same as the actual population, while carrying capacities of environmental resources and economic resources were in surplus. So, it was clear that the government should give rein to advantages of natural and economic resources, developing the economy with great efforts and sparing no effort to strengthen environmental protection. At the same time, it was necessary to be less detrimental to the environment by protecting and making better use of natural resources. The government should also bring in needed personnel and strengthen the construction of social resources.

The third group was Qingzhen city and Xiuwen county with slight overload comprehensive-carrying capacity which were located in the suburbs of Guiyang. Qingzhen was the most overpopulated region with an overload of nearly 50,000 people in 2017. The comprehensive carrying capacity of Xiuwen was surplus from 2003 to 2009, then overload from 2010 to 2012, and surplus again after 2013. Compared with other districts and counties, especially Xiuwen, the economic development lagged behind, and the comprehensive strength was not strong. Thus, it could be seen that Qingzhen city was in a serious state of overload, and various resource-carrying capacities were lower than the actual population-carrying capacity. The government needed to develop regional economy, attract investment, increase economic power, and introduce talents, to promote the development of this region.

Discussion

From the above calculation results of Guiyang’s relative resource-carrying capacities, it can be seen that: firstly, when taking the whole country as the reference area, the comprehensive carrying capacity was always in the state of overload from 2003 to 2017, and the comprehensive bearing capacity first decreased and then increased, reflecting that the development of Guiyang was always lower than the national average in the recent 15 years. However, its comprehensive bearing capacity had been on the increase and the overload state had been on the decrease as a whole since 2008. Secondly, when taking the entire province as the reference area, the comprehensive carrying capacity was always in the state of surplus from 2003 to 2017, and the comprehensive bearing capacity first decreased and then increased, reflecting that Guiyang is the capital of Guizhou province, the comprehensive development level was far higher than the average level of Guizhou province in the recent 15 years, and the sustainable development was relatively good.

Whether taking the whole country or the entire province as the reference area, relative carrying capacities of economic resources and social resources presented an obvious trend of rising and were always in a state of surplus. Relative carrying capacities of natural resources and environmental resources also presented a trend of rising, but they were always in a state of overload. Economic resources- and social resources-carrying capacities made a great contribution to the comprehensive carrying capacity, but natural resource-carrying capacity still played a leading role, indicating that cultivated land area was a relatively weak factor in the development of Guiyang. The cultivated land area was relatively small, and per-capita cultivated land area was far less than the national average level. Relative resource-carrying capacity had been in an overloading state when taking the whole country as the reference area, but when taking the entire province as the reference area, it had been in a surplus state, indicating that with the economic growth and the export of labor force population, Guiyang had effectively alleviated the pressure of local resource-carrying capacity, and still had great potential for development in the future.

Moreover, when taking the whole country as the reference area, contribution rates of carrying capacities of social consumer goods and human resources to the carrying capacity of social resources both showed an increasing trend. The carrying capacity of human resources was smaller than that of social consumer goods, the contribution of which the carrying capacity of social resources had slowly increased. This indicated that with the increase of human resources year by year, the bearing capacity of social resources had steadily increased its contribution to the relative total bearing capacity and improved the contribution of the social resources-bearing capacity to the population-carrying capacity. When taking the entire province as the reference area, the contribution rate of the carrying capacity of social consumer goods to the carrying capacity of social resources had changed little from 2003 to 2017, and the contribution rate of the carrying capacity of human resources to the carrying capacity of social resources had slowly declined from 2003 to 2017, and human resource-carrying capacity was less than the bearing capacity of social consumer goods. This indicated that with the decrease of human resources year by year, the bearing capacity of social resources had presented a trend of declining, and its contribution to the relative total bearing capacity had also showed a trend of declining, thereby hindering the contribution of social resources-bearing capacity to the population-carrying capacity.

In addition, it can be known from the analysis of the relative resource-carrying capacity of each district in Guiyang city that the economy of main urban areas was developed and the comprehensive bearing capacity was in an exceeding surplus condition, while the economy of suburb areas was underdeveloped and the comprehensive bearing capacity was only in a slight surplus condition. This unbalanced regional development was also a key issue in Guiyang’s sustainable development strategy.

Sustainable development strategies

This study analyzed carrying capacities of economic resources, social resources, natural resources, and environmental resources in Guiyang; it could be seen that when taking Guizhou province as the reference area, the comprehensive bearing capacity was in a state of surplus from 2003 to 2017. However, when taking the whole country as the reference area, the comprehensive bearing capacity presented an obvious overload situation from 2003 to 2017. The reason was that the comprehensive strength of Guizhou was lower than the national average level, and it was an underdeveloped province. This result was consistent with the actual situation, indicating that the research method of relative resource-bearing capacity had certain scientific nature. It could also be seen that analyzing the comprehensive carrying capacity status could highlight the problems existing in the sustainable development when taking the whole country as the reference area. There were 10 districts in Guiyang; each district had different resource-bearing capacity and industrial structure, which offered decision evidence for Guiyang to seek differentiated transition and upgrading paths.

The central problem of sustainable development was that the development should be coordinated with the resource-carrying capacity. In view of this, the following suggestions were put forward: (1) The government should pay more attention to the rational development and the efficient use of resources, constantly improve the resource-bearing capacity, and build a guarantee system for sustainable use of resources and a security system for strategic reserves of important resources, to provide resources guarantee for the sustainable socio-economic development. (2) The government should increase protection of arable land resources and water resources. With the continuous development of social economy, protecting cultivated land resources and water resources can improve the bearing capacity of natural resources and increase the contribution rate of natural resources in comprehensive bearing capacity, to effectively improve the overload state of current natural resource-carrying capacity. To reduce the contradiction between supply and demand of water resources, it is necessary to take outside water diversion into consideration after fully considering water conservation and rational allocation of local water resources. (3) Enterprises should accelerate the industrial restructuring, transform the economic growth mode, increase resource utilization rate, and boost the economic development by scientific and technological progress. (4) The government should pay more attention to the reasonable control of the total population and distribution and make reasonable planning and migration adjustment on the population distribution, such as through the industrial transfer and other channels to transfer population in the overload district. And it also can relieve the population pressure by carrying out the population migration from Guiyang to the inside and outside of Guizhou province step by step. (5) Sustainable development was a complex system involving the social economy, resources, and the environment, which cannot be achieved only by solving issues in an aspect. The sustainable development goal of coordinated and balanced development could be achieved through carrying out comprehensive analysis, deep understanding and overall coordination on interactions and mutual relations of subsystems in the sustainable development. (6) In terms of regional differences, economic levels of main urban areas were generally higher than that of suburb areas in Guiyang, and relative resource carrying capacities were obviously higher than that of suburb areas. Therefore, to accelerate suburban economic development and bridge the economic gap between urban areas and suburb areas had played a vital part in the sustainable development in the future. Furthermore, regional interventions need to be encouraged and local legislation should incorporate harmonized principles, policies, strategies, laws, and other agreements to enhance implementation (Juma et al., 2014).

Conclusion

With the purpose of facilitating a balanced development of the environment, resources, and the population, this study analyzed the resource-carrying capacity of Guiyang. On the basis of the existing resource-carrying capacity framework, this study revised the corresponding resource-carrying capacity model. Natural resources were composed of three indicators (energy resources, water resources, and land resources). Human capital resources were incorporated into social resources.

  1. 1.

    When taking the whole country as the reference area, whether based on the traditional relative resource-carrying capacity model or the improved model, the relative comprehensive resource-carrying capacity of Guiyang had been in an overloaded state. Carrying capacities of economic and social resources accounted most for population-carrying capacity, while carrying capacities of natural and environmental resources were always overload from 2003 to 2017.

  2. 2.

    When taking the entire province as the reference area, whether based on the traditional relative resource-carrying capacity model or the improved model, the relative comprehensive resource-carrying capacity of Guiyang had been in a surplus state. The carrying capacity of natural resources was always lower than the actual population while carrying capacities of economic resources and social resources were both higher than the actual population, and environmental resource-carrying capacity was higher than the actual population most of the time except that the 5-year period (2011-2015) was below the actual population.

  3. 3.

    When taking Guizhou province as the reference area, relative resource-carrying capacity states of a total of one city, six districts, and three counties in Guiyang were calculated from 2003 to 2017. During the study period, all the other districts and counties were in the state of surplus, except that Qingzhen was overloaded after 2010 and Xiuwen was overloaded in 2010, 2011, and 2012.

  4. 4.

    It can be seen from the above discussion that the resource-carrying capacity had four dimensions (including social resources, natural resources, economic resources, and environmental resources), which had different impacts on the comprehensive resource-carrying capacity of Guiyang.