Environmental Protection
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2006-06-05 10:27
VI. Ecological Protection and Construction
The
eco-environment in some parts of China has begun to improve after a long period
of unswerving efforts.
-- Afforestation. The Chinese government has set
a guideline focusing on ecological construction for the development of forestry,
organized large-scale afforestation, strengthened the administration of forest
resources, and initiated the compensation system for efforts made to achieve
forest ecological efficiency. As a result, the total newly afforested area has
reached over 6.67 million ha every year since 2002. In recent years, the total
forest area and the amount of forest reserves have increased rapidly; the
structures in terms of age of stand and the form of forest have become more
rationalized, and the quality of forests is improving, achieving a historic turn
from a downward to an upward trend. At present, the national forest acreage is
175 million ha; the forest cover, 18.21 percent; and forest reserves, 12.456
billion cu m. The State has given great attention to ecological forest
construction. Since 1998, China has worked on projects to protect natural forest
reserves, to reforest cultivated land, to build shelterbelts in northern,
northeastern and northwestern China and in the Yangtze River basin, to control
the sources of duststorms in the Beijing-Tianjin area, to build wild animal and
plant reserves and other types of nature reserves, as well as fast-growing,
high-yielding timber bases in some key areas. During the Tenth Five-Year Plan
period, the natural forest protection project succeeded in securing eight
million ha of forest for ecological benefits, enabling 93.33 million ha of
forest resources to recover. The project to reforest cultivated land created
21.33 million ha of forests, among which 5.38 million ha were ecological forests
transformed from cultivated farmland, 12 million ha were planted on barren hills
and wasteland, and 1.33 million ha were created by closing off hillsides for
afforestation. In addition, 6.67 million ha of land were covered in various ways
by efforts to control the sources of duststorms in the Beijing-Tianjin area. The
shelterbelt projects in northern, northeastern and northwestern China and in the
Yangtze River basin as well as other key shelterbelt construction areas resulted
in the reforestation of 3.41 million ha of land, and new greenery on 3.46
million ha of hillsides by closing them off for forest conservation.
--
The protection of pastures. In order to strengthen the eco-construction and
planned management of grasslands, the strategic emphasis has been shifted from
reaching economic goals to "giving equal importance to ecological, economic and
social goals, with ecological goals receiving the priority." As a result, the
vegetation coverage has effectively recovered and the eco-environment on the
grasslands is improving. There is a continued increase in state investment in
pasture protection and construction. From 2000 to 2005, over nine billion yuan
was earmarked for this purpose from the central budget to support the projects
of natural pasture vegetation recovery and construction, the building of pasture
fences and forage grass seed bases, the halting of herding for vegetation
recovery, and grassland eco-construction to control the duststorm sources
threatening the Beijing-Tianjin area. These projects have brought about good
ecological, economic and social results. By the end of 2005, the acreage of
man-made grasslands had added up to 13 million ha, that of improved pasture to
14 million ha and that of fenced pasture to 33 million ha. Twenty percent of the
pastures now practice grazing prohibition, grazing land recovery and designated
rotation grazing.
-- Land protection, development and treatment. The
Chinese government has set the protection of cultivated land as a basic national
policy, and has implemented a strict policy for protecting cultivated land. The
State has designated basic farmland conservation area as the key basis for grain
security. Meanwhile, a land-use control system has been set up to strictly
control the total amount and percentage of land used for construction to curb
the unjustified appropriation of farmland. In 2004, the total farmland used for
construction purposes decreased by 37 percent from the previous year, achieving
an overall balance between use and compensation of farmland. The government has
also increased the intensity of land development and treatment, drawn up
regulations for managing land development and treatment projects, and organized
the implementation of the state-invested land development and treatment
projects, so as to maintain an overall dynamic balance in farmland and to
improve the eco-environment. In the Tenth Five-Year Plan period, 76,000 ha of
land were reclaimed after scientific development and treatment of the land in
rural and urban areas, the natural-disaster-damaged land, and the discarded land
in industrial and mining areas. A number of new rural areas have emerged with
neat layout and sound eco-environment, and the eco-environment of some
resources-drained cities and key mining areas has been further improved or
restored.
-- Water and soil conservation. The State has organized many
special projects to control duststorm sources that threaten the Beijing-Tianjin
area, to conserve water and soil for the sustainable use of the water resources
in the capital area, to build up silt dams for water and soil conservation on
the Loess Plateau, and to prevent and control comprehensively soil erosion in
the black earth area in the northeast and in the limestone areas along the
Southern and Northern Panjiang rivers on the upper reaches of the Zhujiang
River. So far, the key areas of water and soil conservation have been expanded
from the upper and middle reaches of the Yangtze and Yellow rivers to the black
earth area in the northeast, the upper reaches of the Zhujiang River and the
area around Beijing and Tianjin. The construction of national demonstration
areas and demonstration projects has resulted in the completion of over 300
water and soil conservation projects each covering over 200 sq km, 190
eco-friendly model counties and 1,398 small demonstration drainage areas in
terms of water and soil conservation. The State has also started to build the
first group of 62 demonstration areas, each no less than 300 sq km, and over 50
sci-tech demonstration parks for water and soil conservation. Experimental work
for water and soil conservation and ecological restoration has been conducted in
188 counties throughout the country, and overall protection has been carried out
by closing off hillsides for afforestation in all key areas covered by water and
soil conservation projects, putting some 126,000 sq km under such protection.
Also, a project for preventing soil erosion is underway in the headwater areas
of the Yangtze, Yellow and Lancang rivers. So far, 980 counties in 25 provinces
(autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the Central Government)
have wholly or partially closed hills or mountains to livestock grazing, which
has hastened the recovery of the vegetation in areas totaling more than 600,000
sq km. During the Tenth Five-Year Plan period, China succeeded in bringing
240,200 sq km of eroded land under comprehensive control of water and soil
erosion, improving 11,500 small drainage areas, creating 4.06 million ha of
basic farmland, cultivating 15.33 million ha of forests for water and soil
conservation, cash fruit and preserving headwaters, building up 7,000 silt dams
and 3.5 million small water and soil conservation projects involving
silt-blocking dams and slope water works.
-- Sand prevention and
control. The Chinese government has made it a strategic principle to prevent
land degradation and desertification for the improvement of the eco-environment,
for the expansion of the spaces of survival and development, and for
coordinated, sustainable socio-economic development. It has promulgated and
implemented the Law on Sand Prevention and Control, approved the National Plan
for Sand Prevention and Control (2005-2010), and issued the Decision on Further
Strengthening the Work of Sand Prevention and Control. It has also organized a
number of key relevant projects, achieving a net reduction in the areas
suffering from land degradation and desertification. By the end of 2004, the
total area of degraded land in China was 2,636,200 sq km, and that of
desertified land was 1,739,700 sq km, net decreases of 37,924 sq km and 6,416 sq
km, respectively, in a span of five years from 1999. Also, the degrees of land
degradation and desertification had been alleviated, with a shrinkage of 245,900
sq km of the seriously and very seriously degraded land, initially curbing the
overall expansion of land degradation and desertification.
-- Marine
environmental protection. China has formed a basic legal system and an
administrative law-enforcement system for marine environmental protection, set
up a network for monitoring the marine environment, worked out and implemented
marine function zoning and offshore environmental function zoning, so as to
ensure the rational exploitation and protection of marine resources, prevent
marine pollution and ecological destruction, and promote sustainable development
of the ocean economy. The Chinese government has actively implemented a
pollution prevention and control plan for the major sea-flowing rivers, and an
environmental protection plan for the major sea areas. Following the Bohai Sea
program, in 2005 the Chinese government started pollution control work in the
sea areas around the estuaries of the Yangtze and Zhujiang rivers, carrying out
environment monitoring and investigation in these areas, under overall planning
with due consideration for both rivers and oceans, and both land and sea areas.
The Chinese government has strictly implemented the administrative system for
the examination and approval of oceanic engineering projects and of ocean
dumping, intensified law-enforcement supervision over such dumping and
strengthened monitoring of the marine environment. The State has approved the
Emergency Plan for Red Tide Disasters and the Emergency Plan for Major Oil
Spills from Oceanic Petroleum Exploration, and incorporated them into the
national disaster emergency control system, thus giving initial shape to a
marine disaster emergency control mechanism. The Chinese government has
tightened its administration over the prevention and control of pollution from
shipping, and the shipment of dangerous materials, and energetically promoted
the construction of an emergency system for oil-spills from ships at sea. By the
end of 2004, 120 marine nature reserves at different levels had been established
in China, and a group of rare marine species placed under proper protection, in
particular, important oceanic eco-systems such as coral reefs, mangrove forests
and seaweed beds. By means of a series of measures taken to control the
intensity of fishing, reduce the number of fishing boats, improve the moratorium
system, establish marine sanctuaries, and practice zero growth rate, marine
fishery resources have been protected and revived.