www.xinhuanet.com    Author: Dong Jun

Minster of State Forestry Administration Zhou Shengxian put it forward on 28 that till 2010 China’s wetland reservations would amount to 443, which would provide effective protection for 60% of our natural wetland, would keep within limits the trend of shrinking and degenerating, and establish a rough network system for natural wetland preservation.

Zhou Shengxian said at the National Wetland Preservation and Management Meeting that State Forestry Administration would spare no effort in the 5 prior programs, i.e., wetland preservation, restoration, sustainable utilization, coordinative management of the reservations and local communities, and promotion of preserving capability. It would enhance construction of wetland reservations and key international wetland sites, bring into play the active role reservations have in natural wetland conservation, and at the same time take biological and technical measures to check pollution of natural wetlands. It would also implement coordination and management of water resources in key wetland areas and river valleys, and renovate degenerated natural wetlands to restore their ecological functions.  

This meeting affirmed the division into 8 regions of China’s wetlands by their natural properties and threatens they are faced with. The 8 regions are: northeast wetland, wetland of middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River, wetland of middle and lower reaches of the Changjiang River, coastal wetland, southeast and south wetlands, the Yungui Plateau wetland, wetland of northwest arid and semi-arid areas, and the Qinghai-Tibet high-cold wetland. These 8 regions would be treated respectively according to their own conditions.

Zhou Shengxian emphasized on the urgency of wetland preservation, saying that we should put preservation of the wetland into effect as soon as possible, include more natural wetlands into our preservation, take any measure that is effective to check encroach and unlawful destruction of wetland, and reverse the decreasing trend of our national wetland. Impropriation, illegal reclamation, filling, and pollution of natural wetlands should be checked, and severe destruction done to wetlands should be treated by legal remedy.  

China is a “wetland country” with its 36.2 million ha natural wetland which takes 3.77% of its total area. 353 wetland reservations have been established, and 16 million ha, i.e., nearly 40% of the wetland areas have been included into preservation. However, in some areas reclamation of wetlands is still a big problem, which has caused radical decrease in the area of wetland, and degeneration of the function of the wetlands is still deteriorating.