Lake’s cleaner environment suits the birds
Print Edition
More migratory birds chose to overwinter at Poyang Lake in east China’s Jiangxi Province this year.
Poyang, China’s largest freshwater lake, is a seasonal destination for over a million birds. Although most leave for warmer regions such as Australia in the autumn, around 70,000 birds stayed last winter.
Li Chunru, who leads a bird rescue group near the lake, said the area was experiencing warmer winters and environmental protection efforts had improved the ecology.
At the end of 2009, the State Council approved construction of the Poyang ecological economic zone, to explore development that followed a balanced path of ecology and economy.
The local government of Jiangxi also introduced measures to improve the environment in Poyang, such as the Jiangxi wet land protection regulation and the environmental protection of Poyang Lake ecological economic zone regulation, which were both issued in 2012.
The province no longer only uses gross domestic product to evaluate local government performance, and since 2013 has incorporated factors such as emissions and air quality into its assessment system.
Jiangxi provincial authorities said there were further supporting laws, regulations and policies in the pipeline.
Besides Jiangxi, other local governments have released laws and regulations to improve the environment.
Lawmakers in central China’s Hubei Province passed a regulation banning the of slashing and burning of crops in February, which takes effect in May.
Burning straw is a major cause of the PM2.5 particles that are particularly hazardous to health.
In Nanping, a city in the east China’s Fujian Province, 74.75 percent of its land is forested, and its air and water quality are high.
Mayor Lin Baojin said seven of the city’s 10 counties had stopped using GDP as an assessment criterion.
“This does not mean these areas will stop growing economically, as economic development is still key to poverty alleviation. We are just encouraging these counties to pursue high quality and sustainable development.”
The city has also been focusing on developing new industries including biomedical, creative and modern logistics.
Registering average annual GDP growth of 45 percent over the past three years, the city’s per capita annual income for rural residents has grown by 12 percent over the past two years.
Li lauded Nanping as an example of the success of balanced development. “Good natural environment and affluence can be mutually beneficial,” he said.
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