China Exclusive: Challenges behind nature reserves' road to wildlife paradise

Leading national nature reserves in western China signed a memorandum of cooperation on Wednesday, pledging to band together to preserve some of the nation's rarest species.

The new five-member alliance includes Changtang and Mount Qomolangma in reserves in Tibet, Hoh Xil and Sanjiangyuan (Sources of Three Rivers) in Qinghai as well as Altun Mountain Nature Reserve in Xinjiang.

Home to Tibetan antelope, wild yak and Tibetan wild donkey in Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, they cover 575,910 square kilometers and are key to the national ecological security of China and the world, said Li Yingqing, Party Secretary with Altun Mountain National Nature Reserve Administration.

He made the remarks at an annual conference in Qinghai Province this year.

Conservation efforts have made progress - Tibetan antelope were recently removed from the list of endangered species - still, challenges remain.

"The first long-standing problem is lack of manpower and facilities," said Budru, head of Hoh Xil National Nature Reserve Administration.

Lhundrup Tsegye, 26, is among Hoh Xil's 20-odd forestry workers who patrol the harsh and inhospitable 45,000-square-kilometer area.

A single mountain patrol takes at least a week. Each patrol, Lhundrup Tsegye packs off-road vehicles with food, blankets and fuel in preparation of unseen natural disasters or wild animal attacks.

Budru said the nature reserve depends on people like Lhundrup Tsegye patrolling to stop poachers and detect infectious diseases of wildlife.

"The protection methods are backward," he said.

Lei Guangchun, professor with Beijing Forestry University, pointed out that Qinghai Lake National Nature Reserve set a good example by using new digital monitoring methods.

In 2005, more than 6,000 migratory birds were killed by the H5N1 flu strain in the reserve, pushing them to cooperate with 11 departments under the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

To prevent further outbreaks, the Qinghai Lake reserve installed cameras throughout the park to monitor the birds and began tracking their migratory patterns using GPS to see if they've traveled to infected areas.

They also established a wild bird database, allowing researchers using to directly enter information while out in the field computer tablets, which is then shared across several reserves and acts as an early warning for potential outbreaks, Lei said.

"In addition to scientific methods, we also need more funds," said Li Ruofan, head of Sanjiangyuan National Nature Reserve.

The 152,300-square km-reserve only receives around 570,000 yuan (about 92,000 U.S. dollars) from a special conservation fund in Qinghai Province each year.

The fund can only be used for training and management and is not enough to conduct much scientific research, Li said.

In addition to government support, these nature reserves hope to get more help from non-governmental organizations and volunteers in data collection and analysis.

Green River, an NGO established in 1990s, conducted 139 surveys on Tibetan antelopes along Qinghai-Tibet Highway between 2000 and 2001, and released more than 1,400 groups of data.

"Our data provided an important foundation to the setting of migration paths of Tibetan antelopes along the Qinghai-Tibet Railway," said Yang Xin, head of Green River.

China had more than 2,600 nature reserves including 428 national reserves by the end of last year.

Lei Guangchun called on more nature reserves to tackle challenges by working with each other, sharing information and reinforcing daily communication. Endi