Global Tiger Day | Does conservation conflicts community development?

Yaodian village is located on the northwest of "Xiaogouling" that was identified by WWF and its partners in 2019 as one of the key corridors for wild Amur tigers to disperse from the Northeast China Tiger and Leopard National Park to the south of Zhangguangcai Mountains.

In 2021, WWF and Yaodian Village, Yanminghu Town, Dunhua City carried out a series of green development projects, with the aim of integrating conservation and development through green development model.

At first, Zhang Weimin was reluctant to protect wild animals, and he was skeptical of our conservation projects. Actually, most villagers had similar opinions. Biodiversity conservation is a good policy that benefits the whole region, but local areas, such as Yaodian Village, have to pay more to balance conservation and development. For example, minimizing the use of fertilizer can reduce pollution, but it may cause yield and income reduction; optimizing field management can increase yield, but it leads to higher labor costs; sharing resources with wildlife can bring conservation value, but farmers may suffer more losses.