Assessing how land-use changes will affect water-producing ecosystem services is particularly important for water resource management and ecosystem conservation. In this study, the InVEST model and geographical detector were used to assess the water ecosystem service functions of the Ebinur Lake Basin and analyze their relationship with land-use changes. The results show that in the past 25 years, the water yield of the study area showed a trend of a strong yield at first and then a weaker one; there was a relatively large water yield in the west and southeast regions of the basin.

Land administration and management systems (LAMSs) have already made progress in the field of 3D Cadastre and the visualization of complex urban properties to support property markets and provide geospatial information for the sustainable management of smart cities. However, in less developed economies, with informally developed urban areas—the so-called self-made cities—the 2D LAMSs are left behind. Usually, they are less effective and mainly incomplete since a large number of informal constructions remain unregistered.

Whereas most contemporary frameworks evaluating land management aspects focus on institutional settings at a national level, the 8R framework of responsible land management aims at evaluating individual land management projects or interventions. This 8R framework is, however, still under development and needs testing, validation and further detailing, such that specific operational characteristics and internal and external effects can be included in the evaluation.