Qilian Mountains Photo: VCG
The ecological and environmental problems in Qilian Mountains national nature reserve in Northwest China's Gansu Province have been remarkably rectified over the past five years through regular aerial observations by drones and remote sensing monitoring by satellites on human activities, the local development and reform commission announced on Tuesday.The Qilian Mountains plays an important role in the ecological function of glacier and water conservation and serves as a natural barrier to safeguard ecological security in the western region. It is an important part of the national ecological strategy to strengthen ecological environment protection in the Qilian Mountains as well as the realistic need and urgent task of Gansu's sustainable development.
According to Zhu Weichang, deputy director of the Gansu Provincial Development and Reform Commission, regular monitoring on the ecosystems of forests, grasslands, wetlands, glaciers in the area and remote sensing monitoring by satellites on human activities in the national nature reserve have been organized to prevent damage to the ecological environment.
According to Zhu, the environmental regulation and improvement on the periphery of the protection zone of the Qilian Mountains and its surrounding enterprises have been strengthened. A total of 701 farmers from 208 households in the core zone of the national nature reserve were relocated and their residences were demolished.
Evaluations by the Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences show that remarkable achievements have been made in tackling ecological and environmental problems in the national nature reserve and the quality of the ecological environment is steadily improving.
