Environmental Commitments Are Made To Be Fulfilled, Not Broken

by Justin He
(Nanjing, China)

Environmental protection has become increasingly important for many nations. One of the major means to protect environment is to increase forested areas. As a developing country, China is making great efforts to fulfill its commitments made at the meeting of APEC in 2007, that is, forest coverage rate of China will have reached 20% by the end of 2010. Until now, China’s forested areas have increased by 31%.

It is exciting good news. We are familiar with the benefits of forests: clean air, biological diversity and regular and stable change of weather, etc. However, what we should keep in mind is that it is not an easy job to increase the forested areas. It is not just planting as many trees as possible. For example, we should carefully think about the survival rate of forestation and the number of trees to be cut down for market demand.

Although we have made great achievements in increasing the forested areas, we still have a long way to go: China's current forest coverage rate is only 60 percent of the world average and its forest area only accounts for 4.6 percent of the world total. China's per-capita forest area is only one-fifth of the world average. Meanwhile, the gross forest resources are characterized by inadequate supply, low quality and uneven distribution.

To solve those problems, we can make efforts from the following aspects. First, people should be further educated to recognize the importance of forests, which is the most urgent thing we are about to do. Only when people realize the importance, can they take actions. Second, the governmental agencies at all levels shall launch afforestation plans on a regular and nationwide basis. Third, the quality of forest should be improved. Finally, we should make a balance between environmental protection and the utilization of forest resources.

We all hope to have a better and cleaner planet to live in in the future. How do we accomplish this?


-Justin