XINING, Aug. 20 (Xinhua) -- Jonathan B. Jarvis, who worked at the U.S. National Park Service for over 40 years, is excited to see the great achievements that the Chinese have made in pursuit of a "beautiful China".
"I traveled to China in 1996 and was impressed with its beauty and diversity," he said, "but I also saw there was no effective national park service to ensure the protection and management of its parks."
China established a national park system in 2013, which has set up various natural protected areas, including national parks, that cover about 20 percent of the total land area of the country.
"I returned to China in 2018 and was excited to see the support from the country to create a national park system and the professional organization to ensure their stewardship," said Jarvis, former director of the U.S. National Park Service.
China held the first forum on national parks Monday in Xining City, capital of northwest China's Qinghai Province, which attracted more than 450 representatives of regulatory agencies, experts and scholars from home and abroad to discuss topics including the construction and management of nature reserve areas, biodiversity protection and the future of natural heritage sites.
"Through this new national park system, China has the opportunity to contribute to world biodiversity conservation, climate change adaptation, and to show leadership in ecosystem services and the relationship between humans and environment," said Jarvis at the opening ceremony of the forum. "China has world-class natural and cultural resources such as those I saw within the pilot Sanjiangyuan National Park."
China aims to set up a batch of national parks and form a unified management system by 2020 with an aim to connect fragmented habitats and improve the management and conservation of wildlife.
Pilot projects are underway for 10 national parks, including one in Sanjiangyuan in Qinghai, which is home to the headwaters of the Yangtze, Yellow and Lancang rivers.
"China has established a large number of nature reserves with various functions," said Tu Ruihe, representative of the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) in China. "The country is expected to set an example for developing countries and provide Chinese solutions to ecological protection worldwide."
