South China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region has formed a nature reserve protective network after 20 years painstaking efforts that currently play an important role in protecting the region's natural ecological balance and biodiversity.

It now has 64 nature reserves of different varieties, planted with 100 million mu (6.67 million hectares) of public ecological forests. These are considered 64 natural green reservoirs serving agricultural production. Statistics show that annual water storage in the forests stands at 6.48 billion cubic meters. Each year, 14.8 billion cubic meters flow from the reserves, controlling the water capacity of the region's reservoirs and rivers and directly irrigating more than 4.5 million mu (300,000 hectares) of farmland through more than 5,000 channels, as well as becoming an important source of the region's hydroelectric generation.

Most nature reserves are distributed in the border mountainous areas. Soil erosion used to occur frequently here when the daily rainfall exceeded 150 mm. Since the establishment of the nature reserves, damage through human activity has declined, normal ecological functions have resumed and soil erosion has been reduced to a minimum.    

Some 114 varieties of wild plants under state-level protection and most of the region's wild animal resources are distributed in the nature reserves and have been effectively protected with the numbers increasing year by year. For example, the number of white-headed leaf monkeys under state first-level protection has risen from 500 in the early stages of the reserve development to 700 today; the number of black-headed leaf monkeys has expanded from 3,000 to more than 5,000, and the number of rhesus monkeys under state second-level protection has increased from 30,000 to more than 50,000.       

Besides, the nature reserves provide important scientific research and teaching bases for scientific institutes, universities and schools. Domestic and overseas zoologists take a deep interest in the white-headed leaf monkeys, for example. In recent years, the Kunming Institute of Zoology, Peking University, Guangxi Normal University and Hong Kong Kadoorie Farm & Botanic Garden have engaged in research on the species in cooperation with the reserves. Species and biodiversity in the areas of Huaping, Nonggang, Dayao Mountains, Daming Mountains and Maoer Mountains have attracted many domestic and foreign experts.

Currently, the network has been continuously enlarged and improved. By the end of the 10th Five-Year (2001-05) Plan, the region will have added 18 nature reserves covering 161,000 hectares. The total area will increase to 1.8 million hectares from 1.64 million hectares, accounting for 7.6 percent of the region's total area.

(China.org.cn translated by Li Jingrong October 20, 2003)