Objective The dynamic changes of forest and fruit resources in Ruoqiang County were studied in order to provide scientific theoretical basis for guiding the development planning of forest and fruit industry in this area.

Methods The forest and fruit resources in Ruoqiang County were selected as the main monitoring objects, and the '3S' technology was used. The data included the field survey data collected in 2014,2019 and 2023. The spatial and temporal changes and distribution characteristics of forest and fruit resources in Ruoqiang County were analyzed by mathematical statistics and spatial analysis methods.

Results In the past 10 years, the overall forest and fruit resources in the county have shown a decreasing trend, but the types of forest and fruit tree species have been increasing, which not only enriches the types of forest and fruit resources in the county, but also further broadens the development space of forest and fruit industry. Among them, the planting area of jujube is also decreasing year by year, with an average annual change rate of −2.79%, and a cumulative decrease of 4967.07 hectares in 10 years. As of 2023, the jujube planting area reached 11039.36 hectares. The spatial distribution of jujube resources in the county is uneven. From 2014 to 2019, the jujube planting area of Washixia Town ranked first in the county. By 2023, the township with the largest jujube planting scale will be transferred to Tieganlike Town; the main cultivars of jujube in the county are mainly gray jujube and Jun jujube. Through the analysis of the centroid migration of the jujube suitable area in the third phase of Ruoqiang County, it can be seen that the centroid of the jujube suitable area in 2014-2023 showed the characteristics of migration to the northeast.

Conclusion Ruoqiang County has fully implemented the project of improving the quality and efficiency of forest fruits, introduced new tree species for planting, avoided the excessive growth of single species, and also played a positive role in pest control. The area of jujube resources showed a decreasing trend, and the spatial distribution was uneven.