Linking NDVI and climate-based ecosystem stability with land cover in Europe

Abstract

Changing climate conditions are expected to affect vegetation health globally, further emphasizing the importance to assess vegetation response to climate anomalies on a large scale and to understand its driving factors. Within this context, vegetation resilience and resistance against drought and temperature anomalies were assessed using an autoregressive model based on GIMMS NDVI and climate time series over Europe. The extracted vegetation stability metrics were subsequently related to Corine Land Cover classes. The model (i) allowed for exclusion of spurious results and (ii) provided vegetation resistance and resilience metrics normalized for climate variability. These ecosystem stability metrics further showed a clear correspondence with vegetation types in Europe.