Access
This article is part of Nature's premium content.
Published online 11 March 2009 | Nature 458, 134 (2009) | doi:10.1038/458134a
News
Putting China's wetlands on the map
Initiative may shed light on bird flu.
In his attempt to track avian flu in China, Peng Gong ended up creating the only comprehensive wetlands map the country has. When Gong compared that map, described in an article published in Chinese last month, to another as-yet unpublished one, he found that nearly 30% of China's natural wetlands vanished between 1990 and 2000.
To read this story in full you will need to login or make a payment (see right).
Comments
Reader comments are usually moderated after posting. If you find something offensive or inappropriate, you can speed this process by clicking 'Report this comment' (or, if that doesn't work for you, email webadmin@nature.com). For more controversial topics, we reserve the right to moderate before comments are published.
China's efforts to restore wetland is not in harmony with the press for high speed of economy growth (%8 growth of GDP is said a 'must' to the stability of the country). It must be noted that the most important and largest wetlands in China are overlapped by the most active economic areas: The deltas of Changjiang (Yangtzi), Zhujiang, Huanghe(Yellow River) and so on. I was a beholder of the disappearance of the great wetlands surrounding nowadays Shanghai, especially in Pudong New District: the home for innumerable water plants and animals are reclaimed to build factories, office and living buildings, airports and roads. It is a very hard problem to develop economy and to protect the environment at the same time.