The areas targeted for preservation status include volcanic hills in the west and south that date back more than 100 million years to the Jurassic Period, coastal marshes that are home to many bird species, and human construction projects that present evidence of geological changes. A new exhibition hall also is scheduled to be constructed.

The funding commitment was announced on Friday as more than 40 geological experts met to urge society to protect these and many other sites that provide important history lessons in how the land and sea surrounding Shanghai were formed. The city session coincided with Earth Day efforts at the national and world levels.

International Earth Day was first proposed by America's Harvard University on April 22, 1970, and is now supported by the United Nations. China's Ministry of Land and Resources, together with the Chinese Geological Society, proclaimed yesterday's theme to be protecting the country's "geological relics."

Dai Jinming, a senior engineer with Shanghai's Institute of Geological Survey, told Shanghai Daily that since the city is not rich in these relics, it is extremely important to save what does exist among "our living encyclopedia that vividly shows the city's geological evolution."

"While the city is heavily engaged in creating a metropolis, it shouldn't be stingy in drawing up policies to prevent our geological witness from being destroyed," said Dai, one of four institute researchers who surveyed the city's sites to see which need protection. "Like a history book that requires our maintenance, we can benefit from it only when we care for it."

The institute divides the city 's geological relics into two categories. One comprises a natural group that includes volcanically formed hills, shell-rich sandbanks and marshlands; and the other, the artifact group, includes ancient cultural discoveries, manmade evidence of surface-subsidence and ponds reclaimed from the sea.

After a study of local conditions, researchers identified several geological relics that need protection. Among them: seven volcanic-rock hills in Songjiang District, sandbanks in Chongming Island and Nanhui County in the city's east and three bridges on the Suzhou Creek that bear evidence of land subsidence.

At Friday's meeting, Liu Shouqi, secretary-general of the Shanghai Bureau of Housing, Land and Resources Administration's Geo-environment Division, announced that his agency will conduct a two-year effort to intensify the protection of important geological sites.

"First, we will conduct a survey of the city's geological relics and then formulate a detailed protection schedule," Liu said. "Meanwhile, we will build the city's first geological exhibition hall."

(www.eastday.com.cn 04/23/2001)