Chen Jiucheng, a farmer in Pinggu District of Beijing, recently took the district government to court for its one-year delay in reaffirming the ownership of more than 300 trees he had attended for 16 years, the newspaper said.

Chen got the certificate of ownership of the trees in 1983 from the local government, which transferred the ownership to the village committee in 1999, when the municipality launched a program of issuing certificates for collective ownership of forests.

Chen asked for an administrative reconsideration from the Beijing Municipal Government, which ruled last April that the district government should solve the dispute. The municipal government also retracted the ownership certificate from the village committee.

However, the district government did not give Chen any reply though it had conducted an investigation.

The Beijing No. 2 People's Intermediate Court ruled that the district government reply to Chen's application for the re-registration of the ownership of the trees in 30 days.

(Xinhua News Agency April 2, 2003)