The windbreaker belt project in northeast, north and northwest China known as the "No.1 Ecological Project in the World" have entered its fourth construction phase with the trees planted totaling 26 million ha.
Spreading out in 551 counties in 13 provinces (autonomous regions and cities) in the three regions the project covers an area of 4.069 million square km, accounting for 42.4 percent of China's total land area.
Starting from 1978, the project, divided into three phases and eight large projects with construction period lasting 73 years, is expected to bring to finish in 2050 and to turn 35.6 million ha of land into the woodland.
The target of the project is to increase the forest coverage from the current 5.05 percent to 14.95 percent in the three regions with the land desertification and soil erosion brought largely under control, ecological environment and people's living condition greatly improved.
So far, the project has fulfilled the first three phases in the construction. After trees are growing into forest, the forest coverage in the three regions will be increased to 10 percent. Windbreakers in Beijing, Tianjin municipalities, and Liaoning, Jilin, and Heilongjiang provinces have by and large formed a wind-shelter belt. Ecological environment has been greatly improved, thus promoting the economic development in rural areas along with the raising of the people's living standard.
A shelter of 10-million ha from Xinjiang to Heilongjiang has been built up. It is an effective way to curb the sand spouts, sandstorms and land desertification in the two areas, thus greatly reducing the occurrence of sandstorms and damages incurred. In loess plateau and north China hilly areas, soil erosion problem has been curbed. With 12 million ha of trees planted for the prevention of soil erosion a total of 200,000 square km of eroded land has been brought under control, accounting for 40 percent of the land in the area.
A total of 2.4 million ha of forest for farmland and 4 million ha for economic forest have been planted, and a batch of fine fruit bases has been set up with total production value topping 25 billion yuan. All these have greatly promoted the economic development in the rural areas and raised the earnings of farmers.
Grassland construction has made progress in the phasal sense. The protection and management of grassland resources is reinforced by governments at all levels in line with the Grassland Law, and activities such as unauthorized reclamation, excessive digging and overgrazing are forbidden. With the combined efforts of the state, the collective and individ"iuals, grassland construction and control over grassland desertification and deterioration have been strengthened. According to statistics, the total area of artificially sown grass and improved meadows has reached 11.757 million hectares, and that of fenced meadows, 8.333 million hectares. The 49 key comprehensive demonstration projects for grassland stockbreeding constructed by the state have made great achievements. By the end of 1994 a total of 5.638 million hectares of artificially sown grass had been completed, which has blazed a new trail for developing animal husbandry and ecological environmental protection in the areas with arid and desertified land and those with serious soil erosion.
Marine environmental protection has been strengthened. Marine environmental protection is a major component of China's environmental protection efforts, as the country has a vast maritime territory. A series of laws and regulations concerning marine environmental protection has been published, and a nationwide marine environment monitoring network has been set up. Coastal waters have been divided up into zones for administration and effective environmental management is practiced for offshore construction projects, offshore petroleum exploitation and wastes disposal so that marine pollution and resources destruction are taken well in hand, and efforts have been made to prevent ``red tide'' and protect offshore fishery resources. By the end of 1995 14 national-level marine nature reserves had been set up. The water quality in most of China's maritime zones and the surrounding ecological environment have been basically kept in good condition.
The Chinese government has for a long time made unremitting efforts for biodiversity conservation, formulating the China Program for Nature Conservation and China's Action Plan for the Conservation of Biodiversi"ity, containing the policy, strategy and key fields and priority projects for biodiversity conservation.
China has adopted the on-site conservation and off-site preservation methods to protect biodiversity. Currently, there are 612 national-level rare and endangered species of flora and fauna listed as key protection species, including 258 species of wild animals and 354 species of plants. Artificial reproduction has been successfully implemented for more than 60 species of rare and endangered wild animals, and through propagation, such species as David's deer, wild horse and saiga tatarica have been re-introduced.
Establishing nature reserves is the most effective method for the in situ conservation of wild plants and animals. By the end of 1995 799 nature reserves of rather diversified types, covering a total area of 71.85 million hectares (or 7.19 percent of China's territory) had been established in China. There are 99 national-level reserves, of which ten -- Jilin's Changbai Mountains, Sichuan's Wolong, Guizhou's Fanjing Mountains, Hubei's Shennongjia, Fujian's Wuyi Mountains, Xinjiang's Mt. Bogda, Guangdong's Dinghu Mountains, Inner Mongolia's Xilingol, Jiangsu's Yancheng and Yunnan's Xishuangbanna -- have been listed in the International Network of Men and Biosphere Reserves. Another six nature reserves -- Zhalong in Heilongjiang, Xianghai in Jilin, Boyang Lake in Jiangxi, East Dongting Lake in Hunan, Bird Island in Qinghai and Dongzhai Harbor in Hainan -- have been included in the list of the world's important wetlands. At present, a total of 512 historic and scenic sites has been designated, of which 119 are at the national level, 256 at the provincial level and 137 at the city or county level, covering a total area of 9.6 million hectares. Forest parks total 710, of which 248 are at the national level. Scenic spots at Huangshan Mountain, Wulingyuan, Jiuzhaigou and Huanglong are listed as parts of the world natural and cultural heritage by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. The establishment of nature reserves has put a number of representative and typical natural eco-systems with scientific research value as well as rare and endangered species under effective protection.
Establishing zoological gardens, botanical gardens and various artificial breeding centers is an effective method for off-site preservation of various species of wild animals and plants. By the end of 1995 China had set up 175 zoological gardens and zoological exhibition sites in public parks, 227 artificial breeding centers for wild animals, more than 60 large botanical gardens and 255 wild plant gene and cell banks to ensure the continuation of rare and endangered species of plants and animals, including the giant panda, Chinese alligator, Chinese sturgeon, white-flag dolphin, Manchurian tiger, crested ibis, Cathay silver fir, dovetree, Cycas revoluta and camellia chrysantha tuyama. In addition, China has established some dozen specimen centers, one gene bank and two cell banks for wild animals, which have helped genetic polymorphism research and preservation work. The medicinal use of and trade in rhinoceros horn and tigerbone are strictly prohibited by the government, and the illegal hunting of rare wild animals is severely punished by law.
The government has placed much stress on the preservation of the genetic materials from domestic animals and fowls, as well as germ plasma resources from crops. There are 596 species of livestock and poultry in China, of which over 70 percent are native species. The government has appropriated special funds for preservation of some endangered or sharply diminishing species of livestock and poultry and established a germ plasma gene bank for livestock forage grass. China had initially formed a preservation system for germ plasma resources from crops, including one national germ plasma bank for long-term preservation and a duplicate one, 23 local germ plasma banks for mid-term preservation, and 25 national germ plasma nurseries, of which two are for test-tube culture. The germ plasma resources of most agricultural plants in China are preserved, including 330,000 specimens of germ plasma for various species of crops, of which 300,000 have duplicates.
The government also attaches great importance to the environmental protection of the Tibet Autonomous Region. The environmental quality in Tibet today has been kept in an excellent condition. The atmospheric environment there has attained the state's first-level quality and the water quality of major rivers and lakes is also higher than the national standard for the surface waters environmental quality. Forests and grasslands are under effective preservation. The forest area in Tibet totals 7.17 million hectares and the stumpage, 2.084 billion cubic meters. The total grassland area amounts to 82.07 million hectares, of which 70.77 million hectares are usable. With an elevation of 4,700 meters, Namco Lake has become a natural habitat for rare water birds like swans, egrets and sand birds.
Viewed overall, however, many problems still exist -- the shortage of the forest area, grassland degradation, soil erosion, desertification and difficulties in the protection of rare and endangered species of wild animals and plants. Thus, the further strengthening of the preservation of the ecological environment and biodiversity remains an important task for the Chinese government to tackle.
