Conservation Policies

The establishment of the Wolong Nature Reserve in 1963 with 2,000 ha and expansion to 200,000 ha in 1975 by the central Chinese government was the major policy to preserve Giant Pandas, other species, and ecosystem services. Illegal timber harvesting, poaching, collection of fuelwood and Chinese medicinal herbs, agriculture, road construction, and tourism, among other activities, are the primary threats to wildlife and other natural resources in the reserve.

In 1975, commercial timber harvesting was banned, which reduced the deforested acreage within its boundary. However, before 1990s little progress was made to improve the living conditions of the local human population. With agriculture subsidies and introduction of some cash crops, farming households have improved their income dramatically since the 1990s. Untill 2000, when several nationwide conservation policies were seriously implemented in the reserve, fuelwood collection was the major threat to panda habitat. From 1975 to 1998, the human population and the number of households increased by 69% and 124%, respectively, while fuelwood consumption in the reserve doubled from 5,000 m3 to 10,000 m3.

Since 2000, the Grain-to-Green Program (GTGP) has begun to return steep cropland to forests or bamboos and the Natural Forest Conservation Program (NFCP) has subsidized households to monitor assigned forest parcels for illegal harvesting. The average annual subsidy per household from NFCP is around 1,000 RMB (146 USD). From GTGP, farmers receive 70 kg grain (worth 105 RMB) and 20 RMB cash subsidy for each mu (15 mu = 1 ha) of converted cropland every year. Up to 2003, about 360 ha of cropland were returned to forests. Eighty-two ha of cropland were returned to bamboo with a subsidy of about 1,000 RMB per mu. The central government extended the programs in 2007 at 50% of the original subsidies, but they may expire during the 2010s.

These programs have explicitly forbidden any type of fuelwood collection. During the first years of the programs (2000 - 2003), little illegal harvesting or branch collection occurred, partially because many households had leftover fuelwood from previous years. At the same time, 60-80% of the energy needed for cooking human food and about 30-40% of the energy needed for heating houses in winters were switched from fuelwood to electricity. Since 2004, as the remaining fuelwood is being used up, gathering dead tree branches has been seen and even allowed officially (Chen et al., unpublished data).

Electricity has been advocated as a substitute for fuelwood for a long time in the reserve as well as in similar areas worldwide. However, local residents cannot afford to buy electricity for all their energy needs. Interestingly, with investments from many different sources, 8 hydroelectric power plants have been built in the reserve with a total capacity of 33,960 kW, generating a total of 0.15 billion kWh and revenue of 23 million RMB yearly. Before 2000, the price of electricity was 0.07-0.10 RMB/kWh. Currently, it is 0.18 RMB/kWh.

Without the economic support and strict enforcement of NFCP/GTGP, farming households that still use fuelwood will unlikely switch to electricity. After the programs stop subsidies, it is very likely that rural households will step backward and again cut natural forests for fuelwood (Uchida et al. 2005, Liu et al. 2008).

The major challenges for rural households lie in heating their houses in winters, because of the structure and high elevation of their houses, and cooking fodder for livestock (e.g., pigs), one of their main cash and nutrition sources. These two needs together require 80% of the total energy consumption for a typical household.

In addition to electricity, other sustainable energy sources are needed to offset the gap between household demand and supply, particularlly after the current conservation programs expire.

Collecting fuelwood from natural forests damages panda habitat, but harvesting from forest plantations may not. From reforestation after timber harvesting and afforestation since the GTGP began, there were already around 967 ha of forest plantations, mainly consisting of Japanese larch, a fast-growing exotic species. Those forests are monocultural and not suitable for pandas because there is no bamboo underneath. One way to use the plantations is to thin them periodically for fuelwood, which would allow planting of other species, including bamboo, so they can be used by pandas later.

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