Guideline makes it pay for locals to protect ecosystem

Beijing issued a guideline recently calling for improving the compensation mechanism for ecological protection in mountainous areas.

The guideline plans to divert more personnel and capital resources to ecological conservation areas including the Changping and Mentougou districts, as part of the city's continued push to incentivize locals to protect the environment.

Hantai village in Changping district has transformed a 1066.67-hectare stretch of barren mountain into a lush and fertile ecosystem since the first compensation mechanism was released in 2004, officials said.

According to the mechanism, subsidies are given to villages based on the size of the mountainous area in which they are located. Each village has set up an ecological forest management team that is paid from the subsidies to protect the local environment.

To date, the monthly subsidy for each staff member has risen from 350 yuan ($50) to 1,200 yuan in Hantai village.

Local villagers have joined in and become shareholders of collective forest farms, Han Xiuchen, a Hantai villager, told Beijing Daily. "Mountains are our lifeblood. No one can hurt them."

The Beijing government has earmarked a special fund to offer subsidies to the collectives in mountainous areas. The current payment is 40 yuan per 0.07 hectares, with 60 percent of the funds used for the farmers' dividend per share and 40 percent for forest farm operation costs.

Last year, the compensation standard was raised from 40 yuan per 0.07 hectares to 70 yuan per 0.07 hectares.

At Qingshui township in Mentougou district, more than 100 kilometers from Beijing, stands Baihua Mountain, a national nature reserve.

"To protect the environment, the township has initiated two major operations for industrial restructuring in recent years," said Jia Weidong, Party chief of Qingshui.

One came before 2010, when more than 100 coal mines were moved out of the township, and the other, which took place in the past two years, was targeted at the animal husbandry sector.

By July, 14 major poultry farms had been closed down and free-range large livestock had been forbidden in Qingshui due to the damage such operations cause to the environment.

"To encourage farmers to protect the mountains, the first thing that we need to solve is increasing their income," Jia said.

About 64 percent of the town is within the national nature reserve. Mentougou district is home to more than 40 low-income villages, with 20 villages in Qingshui.

The township has a good environment, but how to promote its natural resources and market its high-quality agro-products concerns rural residents, Jia said.

In 2015, Beijing issued an environmental compensation policy for rivers and lakes. According to the policy, if the quality of the water upstream is not up to standard, the upstream area needs to pay compensation for pollution control and treatment to the downstream area.

By 2020, Beijing will expand its ecological protection compensation mechanism to include air, forest and wetlands, as well as key ecological areas, according to the guideline.

Ecology is a kind of social public product that everyone is badly in need of, said Zhang Yang, director of the forest reform department of the Beijing Bureau of Landscape and Forestry.

"Mountainous areas are the main production space for ecological products and deserve the common protection of the whole society," he added.

liangkaiyan@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 08/16/2018 page12)