Abstract
The conflict between poverty and the resulting over-exploitation of natural resources on the one hand, and ecological restoration and sustainable development on the other hand, in the southwest China karst region was studied. In this region, the karst forest (a mixed evergreen and deciduous broad-leaved forest) is rapidly degrading due to over-exploitation (sloping farming). We suggest that an Ecological Compensation (EC) model should be established with: financial institutions, local people, and a third part as an intermediate link. The process would continue for 20 years. As a case study we used Bangui town (3800 families) in the upper reaches of Pearl River. The per capita income of residents was used as the benchmark. The compensation would start with 80%, and decrease to 20% over a period of 20 years. Infrastructure investment would decrease from 20% of the total person’s compensation to 5% as the farmers increasingly use alternative income sources. The EC includes compensation for individual, infrastructure, and environmental investments. The total EC for Bangui would be 305,064 × 104 yuan during the 20 years.
Highlights
Ecological degradation and poverty are the two most significant problems in the karst region of southwest China
From our six-year long research on ecological restoration, we found that achieving sustainable development here is to a great extent an issue of policy
Yang et al (1994) pointed out that low biodiversity, simple structure, and poor anti-interference ability are the main characteristics of karst forests that make them different from other subtropical forests
Summary
Ecological degradation and poverty are the two most significant problems in the karst region of southwest China. It is estimated that karst geomorphology covers about 620,000 km in this region, involving the provinces Sichuan, Hunan, Hubei, Guangdong, Guizhou, Yunnan, and Chongqing municipality, and the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region (Huang et al, 2008). The total area of soil erosion in Yunnan, Guizhou and Guangxi Zhuang has reached 179,600 km, affecting about 40% of the total land area (Wang et al, 2004). The population living in poverty totals 9.1 million, which is nearly a quarter of the population of the province and is oneseventh of the total poverty population of China (Huang et al, 2008). Much research on ecological degradation and restoration of this region has been done in the last 30 years. In one case shrub vegetation was restored and formed by Itea ilicifolia Oliv. and Platycarya strobilacea Sieb. et Zucc. after stopping human disturbance for twenty years in Guiyang’s Eleven Cave area (Huang et al, 1988)
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