China's afforestation of 6.027 million hectares in 2014 exceeded the planned task

On March 11, the Office of the National Greening Commission issued the 2014 Bulletin on the State of Land Greening in China. According to the communique, a total of 6.027 million hectares of forest were afforested in 2014, exceeding the target of the annual afforestation plan. For the whole year, the central forestry investment totaled 151.7 billion yuan, an increase of 6.7 billion yuan over 2013, and the support and incentive mechanism for afforestation policies was significantly strengthened.

The communique takes stock of the achievements of land greening in 2014 and believes that significant progress has been made in the construction of key ecological restoration projects, afforestation and greening of key areas, departmental greening, desert prevention and control, nature reserve construction and wildlife protection, wetland protection, grassland construction, forest tending and management, and so on.

Data show that in 2014, the green coverage area of urban built-up areas increased by about 96000 hectares, and the per capita park green space area of cities in China reached 12.64 square meters, an increase of 0.38 square meters over 2013. The mileage of highway greening will be increased by 130000 km, desertified land will be harnessed by 1.265 million hectares, more than 500,000 hectares of wetlands will be protected, 7.79 million hectares of forests will be nurtured, 10.67 million hectares will be artificially recommended, and 3517.3 hectares of forest land will be recovered. Demonstration areas for desert prevention and control, pilot projects for closed protected areas and national desert parks have been actively promoted, and 23 pilot counties for closed protected areas and 32 pilot national desert parks have been launched.

In terms of afforestation policy mechanisms, there was also gratifying progress in 2014. According to the communique, forestry reform in collective forest areas has been deepened, and the rate of households contracted to households has increased by nearly 2 percentage points compared with 2013; the total number of new forestry cooperative economic organizations has reached 150000, involving more than 16 million peasant households, and 366 demonstration cooperatives of state-level forestry specialized cooperatives have been identified for the first time; the social service system has been continuously improved, and more than 1600 forest right management and service organizations at and above the county level have been established.

In addition, the results of the eighth National Forest Resources inventory recently completed show that China's forest area and forest stock have continued to grow, forest quality has gradually improved, and ecological functions have continued to enhance. The national forest area is 208 million hectares, the forest coverage rate is 21.63 percent, the forest storage volume is 15.137 billion cubic meters, and the forest storage volume per hectare is 89.79 cubic meters. The total carbon storage of forest vegetation in the country is 8.427 billion tons, and the annual value of ecological services is more than 13 trillion yuan. Compared with the results of the seventh inventory, the forest area increased by 12.23 million hectares, the forest coverage increased by 1.27%, the forest stock increased by 1.416 billion cubic meters, and the forest stock per hectare increased by 3.91 cubic meters. The growth target of forest stock in 2020 has been completed ahead of schedule, and the growth target of forest area has been achieved by nearly 60%.

The communique also pointed out that although remarkable achievements have been made in land greening in 2014, the problem of uneven development of afforestation and greening between regions and between urban and rural areas is still very prominent, and afforestation in arid and semi-arid areas and rural areas are still weak areas and need to be strengthened urgently; the contradiction between supply and demand of precious wood and woody grain and oil is very prominent, and the cultivation of precious tree species, high-quality native tree species, characteristic economic forest and biomass energy forest still need to be strengthened. The quality and efficiency of forests and grasslands are still at a low level, and the operation, protection and management of forests and grasslands need to be continuously strengthened; the phenomena of indiscriminate harvesting of forest resources, indiscriminate hunting of wild animals, illegal mining and transplanting of big trees and ancient trees still exist; the encroachment of forest land, grassland, green space and wetlands is still serious, and the publicity, education and law enforcement work on the protection of forests, grasslands, green spaces and wetlands need to be further strengthened. Natural disasters and extreme weather occur frequently, the situation of forest and grassland pests and fire prevention and control is grim, and the task of consolidating the achievements of land greening is still arduous.