Resolving the conflict between development and protection

Bian Xiaoxing will always remember the day she disentangled the body of a pregnant Tibetan antelope from a wire fence during a fieldwork trip in the Changtang Nature Reserve in Ngari prefecture in the Tibet autonomous region.

"It was May, during the Tibetan antelopes' migration period, and we set out to drive along the fence. Soon we found a dead doe hanging off the fence. The body was still warm when I touched it, and I suddenly realized that she was carrying a fawn. The express-ion on the doe's face was indescribably sad and we assumed she had struggled hard before her death. The pregnant antelope was supposed to have her new baby in a month," said Bian, project officer of the Wildlife Conservation Society in Lhasa, the capital of Tibet.

Bian and her colleagues work to improve protection of local wildlife and to prevent incidents such as this. "The fence, which was built by local residents, is intended to protect the rangeland. However, it also disrupts the lives of the wild animals, such as the antelopes, and their migration patterns," Bian said, adding that her overriding priority is to resolve the conflict between the development of the regional economy and protection of the natural world.