Why it’s time to get serious about restoring mainland China’s wetlands and protecting freshwater biodiversity
- Rapid expansion and development of nation’s cities has led to destruction of important rural areas that are home to many plant and animal species
- Ecologist Wen Cheng works with HSBC to repair ecosystem in Guangdong’s Pearl River Delta region to prevent biodiversity loss, flooding and pollution
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Mainland China’s rapid economic growth famously exceeded the world’s expectations. Since 1978, the country’s gross domestic product has increased at an average rate of almost 10 per cent a year and lifted more than 800 million of its population out of poverty, the World Bank has reported.
However, such significant social development, involving reclamation, overgrazing, industrial contamination and urban pollution, has inevitably had an adverse impact on the land’s plant and animal life that continued into the start of the new millennium.
“As the surrounding environment changes rapidly, I’ve witnessed the extinction of several species, in particular wetland species such as the Chinese paddle sturgeon,” says Dr Wen Cheng, who has a doctorate in biology and is general manager of Jinglang Ecology, a company that carries out spatial ecological data analysis and restoration projects across the country.
Studies show that the country’s natural wetland areas have been reduced by more than 35 per cent since the late 1970s. Wen warns that if wetlands – bodies of freshwater that are less than six metres deep, which play a vital environmental role – continue to be at risk, the natural world will face long-term consequences.
