A dataset of water use efficiency in Central Asia ecosystems during 1980 to 2020

Water use efficiency characterizes the coupling relationship between water dissipation and carbon sequestration in terrestrial ecosystems. Understanding the temporal and spatial dynamics of water use efficiency and its response to complex climate change is a prerequisite for dealing with future climate change and man-made disturbances. The ecological model method is considered to be an effective way to assess the carbon and water dynamics of the regional large-scale ecosystem. This study is based on the Arid Region Ecosystem Model (AEM), using site flux data to optimize, verify, and parameterize the model, and build a dataset of water use efficiency of the arid region ecosystem in Central Asia. The time span of this data set is 1980-2020, involving six types of ecosystems including Central Asian coniferous forests, broad-leaved forests, grasslands, phreatophyte shrubs, non- phreatophyte shrubs and farmland. The region includes five Central Asian countries (Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Turkmenistan) and Xinjiang of China. This dataset provides support for understanding the carbon-water dynamics of ecologically fragile areas under the background of global change and maintaining the stability of the ecosystem.