China Adhere to Reduce Forests Logging

A government plan has been issued by the State Council of China’s cabinet say China will reduce logging on both natural and planted forests in the next 20 years.

Depending on government’s guideline, China will reduce commercial harvesting by 20 percent and eliminate logging on state-owned natural forests by 2020.

Amid the many environmental concerns facing China, the country’s forest cover has seen notable progress over the past several decades.

China began aggressive efforts to expand its depleted forests in the 1980s, and that campaign took on a new intensity after 1998, when flooding of the Yangtze River was assigned to rampant logging.

“It is another effort to expand the forest in order to cover across north China to slow desertification,”the government said. This is referred to colloquially as the Green Great Wall.

However, the actions also had unintended consequences. Following the logging ban after 1998 flooding in 13 provinces, China had driven up its imports, which left a triggering fears of damage to vulnerable forests in Southeast Asia.