From the Readers

Nature gets the short shrift

(China Daily)
Updated: 2010-05-31 07:50

Nature gets the short shrift

The report on development encroaching upon the important Yellow River Delta National Nature Reserve is alarming. This nature reserve is a vital transition zone for migratory birds from their summer breeding grounds in Siberia to southern latitudes in winter, and also for their return flights.

As a frequent visitor to China, I am constantly puzzled by the central government's seeming inability to reign in regional development when ecosystems or priceless natural assets are at risk, or to demand environmental impact assessments, including public input, before approving development. Nothing on China's seaboard equals the extent of and importance of this delta. It is of international significance, too, as a unique geological feature.

Yet there is an "experimental" zone that comprises most of the reserve and presumably may in due course become available for industrial use, as is occurring in the "overlap" zone. This possible future extensive industrial use of the delta is yet another example of shortsighted decision-making that will deprive future generations of China's environmental heritage.

Among many other similar blunders in China I refer to the disastrous impact of the Datong-Taiyuan expressway on the Yanmen Guan Great Wall and associated other important heritage objects at the pass. And the Chengde-Beijing expressway which tunnels through the World Heritage-listed Great Wall between Simatai and Jinshanling, destroying the buffer zone and entry panorama to the spectacular Mt Simatai.

Did the government adhere to its obligations under UNESCO's World Heritage charter that binds all nations to protect listed sites from adverse development? Now, cable-cars and car-parks are planned and slip-roads, which have scarred the landscape, will usher traffic from the expressway. Foreign visitors are likely to express disappointment.

Ken Collins, via email

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(China Daily 05/31/2010 page9)