How Pristine Are China's Parks?
نویسندگان
چکیده
We map and analyse the Human Footprint Index at 1 km scale for 1834 terrestrial Nature Reserves of mainland China. There are fewer, larger, more pristine reserves in the colder, drier, less densely-populated pastoral areas of the north and west; and more numerous, smaller, more heavily modified reserves in the warmer, wetter, more densely populated arable agricultural areas of the south and east. This affects the degree of protection afforded to plant and animal species endemic to different ecosystems. Reserves designated at higher levels of governance are more pristine than lower levels, but with considerable overlap. This is significant as China considers possible reclassification of some reserves as national parks (IUCN category II protected areas). More pristine reserves are more likely to meet conservation criteria.
منابع مشابه
Rethinking Tropical Forest Conservation: Perils in Parks
Large, pristine, uninhabited parks are the defining criterion of success in conserving tropical forests, according to some conservationists. It is argued that human residents in tropical forests inevitably deplete populations of large animals through hunting, triggering a chain reaction of ecological events that greatly diminish the conservation value of these forests. Hence, the removal of peo...
متن کاملMercury in Fish from National Parks
Mercury (Hg) is a toxic, global contaminant that threatens ecosystem and human health. Human activities have increased atmospheric concentrations 3-5 fold during the past 150 years. Airborne Hg enters environmental cycles in complex ways, resulting in the contamination of even remote places. The National Park Service (NPS) protects some of the most pristine and sensitive wilderness in North Ame...
متن کاملAssessment of heavy metal pollution in surface soils of urban parks in Beijing, China.
Assessing the concentration of potentially harmful heavy metals in the soil of urban parks is imperative in order to evaluate the potential risks to residents and tourists. To date, little research on soil pollution in China's urban parks has been conducted. To identify the concentrations and sources of heavy metals, and to assess the soil environmental quality, samples were collected from 30 u...
متن کاملMarginal voices in "wild" America: race, ethnicity, gender, and "nature" in "The National Parks".
The preservation of land as national parks has been arguably the most successful feature of a nationwide increase in environmental awareness, referred to as the “greening” of America. The many and varied units in the national park system provide collective reassurance that, despite environmental excesses in other areas, the people of the nation understand the value of nature in its purportedly ...
متن کامل