Pastoralism and Rangeland Management on the Tibetan Plateau in ...

(Wang, Sun et al. 2005; Wang, Deng et al. 2005). According to China’s regional
ecological environment <strong>and</strong> ecological shelter development strategies,
<strong>and</strong> from a practical application point of view, in order to further clarify the
ecological development objectives while highlighting development priorities,
ecological shelter functions will be divided into the following categories:
�� Purification function
�� Shelter function
�� Soil conservation function
�� Water manipulation function
�� Bio-diversity conservation function
1.2 Forests <strong>and</strong> pastures as an ecological shelter
Pastures <strong>and</strong> forests are valuable biological resources on the planet <strong>and</strong> an
important ecological shelter of the Earth. They have different functions in climatic
conditions of different regions. For China, one view holds that forests are
a major ecological shelter in the country because the forest can preserve water
<strong>and</strong> soil <strong>and</strong> can also reduce wind by a small amount. Therefore, it was once
advocated that 65 % of the country’s forest l<strong>and</strong> should be zoned as a “conservation
area”. In the arid <strong>and</strong> semi-arid rangel<strong>and</strong> regions of the northwest the
“Grain for Green” policy has also been generally adopted. These views remain
the main trends of the day, though there is another view that “Pasture is China’s
largest green shelter” <strong>and</strong> “the main source for soil <strong>and</strong> water conservation”, but
this voice is very weak.
To clarify which of these ways of thinking is most accurate is of great significance
for the creation of sustainable development strategies in China. This
clarification can help prevent poor decisions from being made that might lead
to a large amount of human, material <strong>and</strong> financial resources to be wasted.
Analysis of the key ecological issues <strong>and</strong> the main ecological shelters can help
us find the right strategy <strong>and</strong> the respective measures.
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