China News Service, Antalya, November 10 (Reporter Wei Yuan and Wang Qingkai) From protecting the landscape of the Li River to building green canals to cross-border biodiversity protection, on November 10, local time, at the China Corner theme side event of the 31st Conference of the Parties (COP31) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP31) held in Antalya, Turkey, Chen Liang, director of the Department of Ecology and Environment of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, used three cases to share Guangxi's practice in building a beautiful China.
With the theme of "Ecological Civilization and the Practice of Beautiful China", this side event was hosted by the Xi Jinping Thought on Ecological Civilization Research Center and China News Service, and co-organized by the Environmental and Economic Policy Research Center of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment and China News Network.
“The mountains and sea in Guangxi embrace each other, with Guilin in the north and the most beautiful beaches in the world in Beihai in the south. It is an important ecological barrier in southern China and one of the most typical regions with karst landforms in the world.”
During the case sharing session at the side event, Chen Liang introduced that Guangxi adheres to ecological priority and green development, and the quality of its ecological environment ranks among the best in the country. The construction of a beautiful Guangxi has achieved remarkable results.
The Lijiang River is the soul of Guilin’s landscape. Chen Liang said that in order to protect the landscape of the Li River, Guangxi has established the "Li River Protection Day", introduced 11 local regulations, invested 5.5 billion yuan, completed the conversion of more than 1,200 tourist rafts from oil to electricity, and 27 cross-river cables for ground renovation. The water quality of the main stream has been stable to Class II all year round, and Guilin has been selected as the United Nations "Natural City" platform. Currently, Guangxi is promoting an overall campaign to upgrade the ecological environment of the Li River and build a world-class tourist city.
In September this year, the Pinglu Canal, the first grand canal connecting rivers and seas since the founding of New China, was officially opened to navigation.
Chen Liang introduced that from the planning, design, construction to operation of the canal, green concepts run through the entire process: "ecological corridors" and "ecological conservation areas" were written into local regulations for the first time; the Pinglu Canal built the country's first "Double Fish Channel" connecting rivers and seas, the first long-span canal wildlife passage and the world's largest inland river provincial water lock, opening up a fish migration channel that had been isolated for more than 60 years.
At the side meeting, Chen Liang also introduced Guangxi’s practice of protecting cross-border creatures.
"The Eastern Black-crested Gibbon was once considered extinct. When it was rediscovered in the forest on the China-Vietnam border in 2006, there were only 3 groups of 19 individuals." Chen Liang shared that Guangxi and Vietnam have established a joint protection mechanism to jointly conduct scientific research and monitoring, restore habitats, and combat illegal logging and poaching. "Today, the global population has recovered to 11 groups of 74 individuals, more than half of which live in Guangxi, becoming a model for global cross-border biodiversity conservation."
Chen Liang introduced that Guangxi has established cooperative relations with nearly 50 ASEAN scientific research institutions to create the "China-ASEAN Young Green Envoys' Visit to Guangxi" cultural exchange brand, and expanded the bilateral tacit understanding of protecting a species into a joint action by regional countries to deal with climate change.
"Guangxi is not only an ecological highland, a treasure land for health and wellness, a cultural resort, and a blessed land of mountains and rivers, but also a frontier for open cooperation with ASEAN and the joint construction of the 'One Belt, One Road'. Guangxi is willing to continue to deepen exchanges and cooperation with all parties in the fields of ecological environment governance and response to climate change," Chen Liang said.
