The Great Hinggan Mountains in northeast China’s Heilongjiang
Province, one of the country’s largest state-owned forest zones
is facing a very real threat to its continuation. Experts suggest a
new-round national survey to be conducted on forest resources, so
as to adjust timber production plans and ensure sustainable
development of natural forest resources.
The Great Hinggan Mountains are one of the country’s major
natural forest distributing zones. Since 1964 it has been exploited
as a timber production base. In 1998 it was listed among the first
batch of trial bases implementing the Natural Forests Conservation
Project.
The project imposed a restricted amount of timber to be cut in
the zone. As a result, the timber output has decreased to 2.14
million cubic meters by 2003, half of which are saplings cut from
well-tended eco-forests, and nearly 800,000 of which are
over-mature trees from commercial forests.
However, a dilemma still exists despite the fact that the amount
of timber cut decreases each year. On the one hand, resources
available for logging are quite limited since the commercial
forest, accounting for one fourth of the total forest, has been
over-logged for 40 years. At the current cutting speed, no trees
will be left for logging within16 years, and people will have to
wait another 36 years for under-mature trees to grow. On the other
hand, saplings in well-tended eco-forests cost a lot and sell at a
comparatively low price. For enterprises engaged in logging, the
more they cut, the greater loss they suffer. To make up losses,
they have to secretly cut mature trees.
Why do natural forests available for logging in the Great
Hinggan Mountains become less five years after the Natural Forests
Conservation Project kicked off? Experts put the blame on plans for
timber production divorced from that of practice.
Dai Wanchun, former official from the administrative office of
the Great Hinggan Mountains, said the amount of timber cut
designated by relevant administrative departments doesn’t tally
with practical operation. It cannot realize sustainable development
and must be revised.
Most trees from Jiagedaqi to the Mohe River are second growth.
Half of the 10 forestry bureaus in the region find it difficult to
engage in logging in the area. A local official in charge of
forestry administration admitted that 30 percent of forests in the
area are“adolescent” timber.
The gloomy future makes people worried. “The forest will become
a loess plateau if no measure is taken to preserve it,” said Wang
Tianhui, head of Tuqiang Forestry Administration. While Tang
Tingdi, deputy director of the Great Hinggan Mountains Region
Working Committee of the Heilongjiang Provincial People’s Congress
Standing Committee, worries that the Natural Forests Conservation
Project will fall between two stools.
Sheng Weitong and Huang Heyu, experts from the Chinese Academy
of Forestry, warn that if the current situation continues,
forest resource conservation will face great difficulties and the
forestry ecological function will be weakened, thus threatening the
safety of the Heilong and Nenjiang rivers as well as industrial and
agricultural production on the Songnen Plain. The area would suffer
a resource and economic crisis.
Experts suggest the amount of timber cut be decreased in the
Great Hinggan Mountains.
(China.org.cn translated by Zhang Tingting, September 11,
2003)