NW China’s Nianbaoyuze National Geopark makes remarkable progress in ecological environment

Nianbaoyuze National Geopark in Jiuzhi county, Golog Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, northwest China's Qinghai province, has made remarkable progress in ecological protection in recent years.

Endowed with beautiful lakes and mountains, Nianbaoyuze, with a main peak of 5,369 meters above sea level, the highest peak of Bayan Har Mountains, was authorized as a national geopark in 2005.

An official of the protection and management bureau of Nianbaoyuze scenic area, in Jiuzhi county, Golog Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, northwest China's Qinghai province, gives an interview to People’s Daily Online. (Photo/Liu Huan)

Nianbaoyuze once suffered from mounting pressure on the ecological protection due to an increasing number of visitors. There were 106,000 visitors in 2017 alone, according to Baqie Duojie, an official responsible for publicity and promotion in the protection and management bureau of the Nianbaoyuze scenic area.

It was temporarily closed in April 2018, while the local government shifted focus to environmental protection of the national park.

Photo shows the scenery of Nianbaoyuze. (Photo/Liu Huan)

“Our measures included demolishing all of the illegal constructions and business stalls, leveling and filling the slopes along the highways leading to the scenic area, and eliminating littering and plastic pollution, with workers on duty for 24 hours,” said Baqie Duojie, adding that they adopted closed-off management, which means all tourism and business activities came to a halt.

The hard work has paid off, as evidenced by the return of wild boars and some other animals that left their habitat years ago due to environmental degradation.

“We are going to repair the grass damaged by wild boars,” said Jiayang Zhuoma, a 20-year-old female member of an ecological protection team in the scenic area.

Colorful flowers bloom on the riverbank in Nianbaoyuze. (Photo/Liu Huan)

The native of Nianbaoyuze introduced that thanks to the efforts in ecological restoration in recent years, the wild animals in her childhood memory have come back.

In recent years, Golog has taken measures such as advancing key ecological projects and perfecting the ecological compensation system and other relevant mechanisms to promote ecological protection, said Wu Yuzhang, Party secretary of the prefecture.