Sustainable development blog : ecology and humanitarian aid

Translated from the original Italian (http://www.blogecologia.it/2010/10/grande-muraglia-verde-contro-la-deser...) by Marcella Oliviero.

It has been called “The Great Green Wall”; a project for a planned environmental barrier to quickly stop desertification and fight against climate change in China. By 2050 it has been estimated that the artificial forest will reach 400 millions of hectares and will cover more than 42% of the whole country. China already boasts the biggest artificial forest of the world that actually covers more than 500,000 square kilometers. The project was

started in 1978, three years after it had been approved by the National Congress of the People (the highest legislative body in China) and it has been made a duty for every citizen older than 11 to plant at least three poplars, eucalyptus, larches or other different kind of tree every year.

Ordinary people in China have planted around 56 billion trees during the last ten years. In 2009 China planted 5.88 million hectares of forest. China plants more than double the number of trees that the rest of the world plants in a year. In 2007 China has exceeded the United States as the number one world emitter of carbon and, unfortunately, emissions will continue to grow with the expansion of the Chinese economy.

On the other hand, the country has invested a lot in new, clean technologies and it has committed itself to the closure of thousands of highly-polluting heavy factories but it has not succeeded in accepting  international (emissions reduction) standards. The new forests are a better solution for absorbing carbon than slow growth forests because faster-growing trees like birch or white poplar capture double the quantity of carbon that Korean pine, larch or fir do.