Nearly 100 rare trees introduced from overseas died after being transplanted to Hefei, capital of Anhui province.

The trees, all lagerstroemia indica from forests in Vietnam, were introduced to Nangang township in the city's Shushan district by a landscape gardening company at the end of last year.

The 98 trees were confirmed dead on Tuesday after an inspection by forestry experts, "The attempt failed because of the difficulty of transplanting trees from low latitude to high, the wrong choice of season and malpractice in maintaining tress," according to a statement from the district's bureau of agriculture, forestry and water resources, which was provided to China Daily on Thursday.

The authority said the landscape gardening company was introduced by the government last year. As planned, the company would plant rare kinds of trees in a 250 mu (16.6 hectare) garden to attract tourists and vacationers.

Hu Jinshan, deputy head of the district's forestry authority, said the company has the right to decide what kind of trees are transplanted from abroad as long as it completes related requirements, The Beijing News reported.

The statement from the bureau said it felt a "profound pity" as the company has suffered a big loss.

The news sparkled disputes among local residents and across the online community, as netizens said it was a huge waste to plant rare trees that have difficulty surviving.

"It made no sense to plant such expensive trees as other kinds of tree can also improve environment," said Cao Jing, a 30-year-old resident in Hefei.

In April, authorities in Qingdao, Shandong province, apologized to local residents for a controversial tree-planting project, as there was no hearing or soliciting of public opinions before it started. The project was blamed for destroying lawns.

Ma Chenguang and Liu Donghui contributed to this story.