China’s afforestation effort are bearing fruit. Recently released figures show that
The country’s forest coverage has risen to 18.21 percent of the land area, from 8.6 percent in the early 1950s, the official said at a forum on desert control and ecological civilization in Bijie of Guizhou Province in southwest China.
Nationwide forest restoration efforts have helped fuel the fastest expansion of man-made forests in China, taking up 53.2 percent of the global annual increase, or one third of the world’s total, said the SFA.
China’s forest acreage reached 175 million hectares last year, raising the country’s forest coverage to 18.21 percent, compared with 12 percent in 1981.
As always with China, the per capita numbers bring one up short, despite these world-beating tree planting efforts:
The per capita public green area edged up 0.41 to 8.3 square meters last year, which is still much lower than the international average.
Nevertheless, the people are pitching in
Earlier, the SFA revealed in its 2007 Green Coverage Report that 51.54 billion trees had been planted by ordinary Chinese people in the past three decades.
Among the tree planters was none other than Chinese President Hu Jintao, shown here helping out at Olympic Forest Park in Beijing, April 1, 2007.
China often cites these efforts as part of its fight against climate change, and rightly so. Of course, to be sustainable (as opposed to merely temporary carbon sinks), especially from a water usage standpoint, the trees planted should be indigenous to the area. There have been concerns that perhaps in China’s headlong rush to plant trees sustainability was not always considered. I can attest that in the urban greenery department, the plantings are often beautiful, but frequently not native species. I hope that the mass afforestation efforts in the countryside have been better planned.
4 responses so far ↓
1 David Yaussy // Jun 11, 2008 at 8:58 pm
Good to see a report from a West Virginian in China. Who should know more about trees and forests than a boy whose roots are in Pocahontas County?
2 cmcelwee // Jun 12, 2008 at 10:25 am
Nice to hear from you David! Nothing can beat Pocahontas County in the fall (or any other time for that matter, but I have to maintain a certain objectivity here).
3 Duncan // Jun 12, 2008 at 8:04 pm
One has to take these reports with a pinch of salt. Just a glance at the proportions of territory that cities claim are “green space” in their stats reports will tell you that they must be using extremely generous definitions of green coverage…
4 cmcelwee // Jun 13, 2008 at 2:46 pm
Good point Duncan. Those potted plants which line the inner ring road may get counted in the “green” space numbers. Green space can spring up very quickly though. I was walking home recently on a route I hadn’t taken in about three weeks when I suddenly thought I had taken a wrong turn. I was faced with a 2 acre park I had never seen before. Turns out that the buildings that had previously lined this corner of the intersection had been torn down, “hills” had been sculpted in the dirt and boulders and twenty year old trees had been placed here and there. I was glad to see that the same speed applied to building things can also be applied to greening them.
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