Why can't all the "ecological construction" efforts in China jump out of the curse of "partial improvement and overall deterioration"? Analysis of the implementation of the above-mentioned ecological engineering projects mainly has the following reasons:

1. Excessive dependence on engineering construction. All ecological projects are characterized as "ecological construction projects". Therefore, returning grazing to grassland has become a fence construction project, watershed protection and management has become a water conservancy project, desertification control has become a shelter forest construction project, and even the management of protected areas has become a protected area construction (road construction in Gai Lou), and the panda protection management plan formulated in cooperation with international institutions has also become a project construction. Behind the "engineering construction" is a large amount of funds operating in the mode of "engineering construction", which is also related to the fact that the "engineering construction" project has actually become a major economic activity. Whoever can operate and win the "engineering construction" project will be both glorious and affordable. Therefore, the state's investment in protected areas (through forestry bureau, etc. ) is mainly distributed in the form of capital construction fees, so there is a saying that "the protected area broke ground". But the question is, how can national natural resources management become a national capital construction, or even operate in an economic mode? Nature reserve is a natural ecological environment. Besides threatening the ecological environment, what is the significance of "breaking ground" to the biodiversity of nature reserves? Taking the project of returning grazing to grassland as an example, the purpose of the project is to protect and restore grassland, but it is characterized as "construction project", and even adopts "bidding system" and "project supervision system" to make a grassland restoration and protection project an economic activity (and provide resources for economic corruption). A large number of fence projects have turned the original vast grassland into a fence. It has seriously hindered the free activities and exchange migration of wild animals (including breeding migration and foraging migration). ), even caused ungulates on the grassland to die of thirst because they could not find water in the fence, and some large wild animals were crushed to death on the fence, thus becoming a serious threat to wild animals. Fence construction has seriously damaged the food chain of grassland, making the grazing factor, the key ecological factor to maintain grassland, suddenly disappear. Although the grassland productivity in some areas may be temporarily improved due to the sudden elimination of grazing pressure, it also provides a large number of breeding conditions for rodents and other grassland pests, laying a curse for the grassland. As some local cadres and masses said, it will be more troublesome to leave a bunch of projects after the project is over.

2. Too superstitious about afforestation. Almost all ecological projects take afforestation as an important construction content. According to the statistics of the State Forestry Administration, from 1949 to 2006, the afforestation area in China reached 253160,000 square kilometers, accounting for 26.4% of the national territory, which actually exceeded the actual forested area in China (excluding glaciers, rocks and waters). According to the data released by Forestry Bureau in 2006, the forest area in China is 6.5438+0.749 million square kilometers-even much smaller than the afforestation area, of which the plantation area is 536,000 square kilometers (accounting for 265.438+0.2% of the afforestation area). According to the data of "Three North" shelterbelt construction, every afforestation 1 hectare, the investment is about 446 yuan, and the afforestation area of 25310.6 million square kilometers needs to invest 65.438+010.29 billion yuan. If the actual afforestation area announced by the State Forestry Administration is 536,000 square kilometers, it is true that there are forests without death, then where is the investment of about 89 billion yuan (253,438+05 minus 5.36) for other afforestation areas? Corresponding to the afforestation area of 2.53 million square kilometers, the forest resources in China have been continuously degraded and disappeared. In fact, from the situation of artificial afforestation in China, we can roughly see the situation of forest destruction in China. To some extent, afforestation has become an excuse for wanton logging. For example, the loud slogan of "chop down one tree and plant ten trees" put forward by the forest logging factory cuts down the real forest, and a variety of saplings also means the disappearance of the original forest. Excessive enthusiasm for afforestation is not only related to the "people-oriented" ideology, but also related to the interests of the department: you can get a lot of money and reflect your political achievements. The negative impact of afforestation is particularly prominent in the arid and semi-arid areas of northwest China: large-scale afforestation projects are not only difficult to survive, but also cause serious damage to native vegetation (grass, shrubs and semi-shrubs), while some demonstration projects and image projects need a lot of water to survive, which in turn leads to the depletion of water resources, resulting in "a small piece of green, a large piece of desert".

3. Lack of participation and "industry monopoly" of natural resources management departments. The management of natural resources such as forests, grasslands, water and wetlands is monopolized by departments from management to utilization, thus forming a monopoly interest group from management to scientific research to utilization. From decision-making basis to organization and implementation to monitoring and evaluation, it is often the "planning institute" and "research institute" in the industry, and it is difficult for outsiders to participate. A forest often belongs to the "General Administration of Forest Industry", and the local law enforcement department, the Forest Public Security Bureau, is a subordinate department of the General Administration of Forest Industry. The General Administration of Forest Industry is not only the cutting and utilization department, but also the law enforcement department of forest management. It's okay for the General Administration of Forestry Industry to shave the whole mountain, but a local villager has been arrested by the forest farm for stealing one or two trees and sentenced to two years' imprisonment. It seems that the forest police are more to protect the interests of this department. As a wildlife management department, Forestry Bureau has opened hunting grounds and even directly participated in international hunting. The "industry monopoly" of natural resources management departments is often ignored because it doesn't seem to involve much capital. In fact, natural resources or ecological environment are difficult to measure with money, and they are also "industries" with the greatest potential for "value-added". The harm of "natural resources monopoly" is far greater than the industry monopoly of economic sectors, because they manage the sustainable development resources of the whole country and are related to contemporary and future generations. Due to the monopoly of natural resources, the following phenomena have appeared: in order to pursue immediate political achievements and economic benefits, the fishery management department under the agricultural department introduced male pond fish, which was particularly popular in Japan at that time, to some freshwater lakes in Xinjiang in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and it multiplied in a large number in just a few years, leading to the extinction of local fish species. Then, the fishery department applied for a project to cultivate local fish species in the name of protecting local fish species. Therefore, the successful introduction of male fish in ponds has become a political achievement and protected local fish species. Other resource management departments, such as forestry departments and water conservancy departments, also have such strange phenomena: logging is a political achievement, and replanting trees after logging is both a political achievement and a project fund; Of course, water control is a political achievement. If water control is gone, it still needs funds to restore wetlands or political achievements.

4. Lack of independent supervision and evaluation system is often replaced by "superior inspection". Corresponding to industry monopoly, the monitoring and evaluation of ecological projects are made by the competent department of the project (also the project implementation department) and organized and implemented by the monitoring and evaluation. It is difficult for the outside world to have the opportunity to participate in and understand the real data, and the result is always good project performance and deteriorating actual ecological environment. The established evaluation criteria are conducive to highlighting political achievements, but they are diametrically opposed to the goals of ecological restoration and protection. For example, the project of returning grazing to grassland is not to monitor grassland restoration (not linked to funds), but to take the quality of fence project as the standard (directly linked to funds). Is the project of returning grazing to grassland for fencing or grassland restoration? Can the quality of the fence represent the quality of the grassland? How many fences have been built and how many trees have been planted have actually become political achievements. "Overall deterioration and local improvement" is not only the best excuse, but also a portrayal of the real situation.

5. The project establishment mechanism is not perfect, and "running the project" has become the goal of business departments and government departments at all levels. Some ecological projects lack objective, fair and transparent argumentation, scientific analysis of problems and blind pursuit of engineering construction. It seems that the project is not for solving ecological problems but for engineering construction (behind which is a lot of money). The construction of the "Three North" shelterbelt is to solve the "sandstorm hazard and soil erosion" in the Three North areas, but what are the deep-seated reasons for the sandstorm hazard and soil erosion? Can artificial afforestation be "symptomatic"? Can artificial afforestation survive? Artificial afforestation should be at the expense of water resources and even native vegetation. What will be its negative impact? After 30 years of project implementation, there is no objective, neutral and scientific monitoring, evaluation and analysis except applause. The project of returning grazing to grassland is based on the assumption that overgrazing leads to grassland degradation. The project is implemented in fence construction, and there is a lack of in-depth and comprehensive analysis of grassland degradation: Is overgrazing the only cause of grassland degradation (obviously there are other reasons, such as oasis development leading to water depletion and even improper afforestation)? Why is there grazing? As for aerial seeding, there is also a lack of scientific data support, and grassland is short of water rather than seeds. Another typical example is the desert grassland in the arid area of northwest China, which is traditionally managed by the agricultural sector and contracted to herders as grassland. The project of returning grazing to grassland has not yet ended, and a large number of grasslands (mostly semi-shrubs with a height of 10-30 cm) have been classified as "national public welfare forest project areas" by the forestry department and reclamation is prohibited. The same piece of land is not only the area of returning grazing to grassland in the agricultural sector, but also the public welfare forest area in the forestry sector, so in some closed areas,

6. "One size fits all" and "acclimatization" of policies and projects. The western region generally includes the arid northwest region, the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau region and the humid south China region. The difference between ecological environment and society, economy, tradition and culture is so great that although Inner Mongolia is an autonomous region, the eastern region is more like the northeast region. However, when we make policies, we almost always adopt the same method. For example, copying the agricultural policy of the mainland to the vast pastoral areas, there is actually no arable land to retreat in the arid areas of northwest China, but there will be no funds if it is not retreated. In some areas, it is necessary to reclaim desert, and then return farmland to plant trees, so as to get the national project funds. However, the original desert vegetation is destroyed, and all the trees planted will die if they are not watered after the inspection period (if they can survive during the inspection period, they will be counted as artificial forests). Animal husbandry tax is the former local government repeatedly encouraged the development of aquaculture, according to the number of sheep, cattle, horses and camels raised to collect taxes. After the exemption of agricultural tax, the herdsmen's animal husbandry tax was also exempted. For local officials, cattle and sheep are no longer the source of local national economic income, and sheep suddenly become "scapegoats" for grassland degradation. Another "one size fits all" phenomenon is that in the arid areas of northwest China, small-scale "demonstration projects" have been blindly promoted to the whole region. For example, at the international grassland and grassland conference held in Hohhot in early July, the relevant spokesman of the Ministry of Water Resources put forward a plan to vigorously develop water conservancy facilities in grassland areas to improve the carrying capacity (quantity) of grassland. The scientific basis is: through the project demonstration, it is proved that the establishment of water conservancy facilities in the demonstration area can greatly increase grassland production, thus increasing livestock carrying capacity and herdsmen's income. However, the demonstration project ignores the most important question: where does the water for water conservancy facilities come from? Whether pumping groundwater or building dams in the upper reaches of rivers, the improvement of local bearing capacity of demonstration projects is at the expense of large-scale water depletion (groundwater table decline, downstream water depletion) and environmental degradation. If we blindly promote such demonstration projects, there will be great risks, which will not only waste national funds, but also cause serious ecological deterioration problems such as water depletion and desertification.

7. Repeated policies and top-down policies have caused the credibility crisis of governance, which is especially manifested in grassland governance: before the 1990s, sheep were strongly advocated to support national construction, and after the 1990s, sheep became "sinners" of grassland degradation, and even vigorously promoted "grazing prohibition"; In the 1980s and 1990s, grassland contracting was carried out twice, each time for 50 years. However, in recent years, "enclosure circulation", "returning grazing to grassland" and enclosure of public welfare forests are all using various methods to recover herdsmen's grassland contract certificates. The grassland familiar to herders for generations was suddenly classified as "natural forest" by the forestry department for protection, which made herders puzzled: how could the grassland suddenly become a forest? Where is the forest?

In view of the above problems, if you want to jump out of the curse of "local improvement, overall deterioration", you should consider solving them from the following aspects:

1. Break the phenomenon of "industry monopoly" in natural resource management and separate "management right" from "use right". In this regard, we should learn from foreign experience, for example, Thailand has a special department of "natural resources and ecological environment"; The United States Department of the Interior is responsible for the protection and management of forest resources and national parks (including protected areas). ), fish and wildlife, and related uses, such as logging, are implemented by the agricultural sector. If we do not break the "industry monopoly", it will be difficult to effectively manage the country's natural resources.

2. "Engineering" project management should learn from the experience of international natural resources project management, establish a scientific and transparent project demonstration system and an objective, fair and neutral monitoring and evaluation system, and strengthen the participation of the whole society. To break the system of management from demonstration to implementation to evaluation by the same department, the project management department and the project implementation department should be properly separated. Many projects can be implemented by society, such as non-profit organizations. In recent years, China has little determination to protect the ecological environment, such as natural forest protection project, returning farmland to forests project, protected areas and wildlife protection project. Each project has reached hundreds of billions of RMB, but they are all called "ecological environment construction". If we don't change and improve the management system and system, there will be less protection like giant panda protection, and it is inevitable that virgin forests like forest management and protection will almost disappear.

3. Consideration should be given to setting up departments related to "natural resources and ecological environment" in powerful inter-departmental and policy research departments such as National Development and Reform Commission, West Development Office and the State Council Development Research Center. If the powerful department of "approving projects" lacks the minimum knowledge and awareness of natural resource management and ecological environment, relying on the competent business department will inevitably lead to mistakes in strategic decision-making. For example, what is the status of forest resources in China? This can't just rely on the statistical report of the forestry department. Our logging in these years is "far below the growth", and afforestation is the first in the world. But why did the forest ecosystem continue to deteriorate and the virgin forest was almost lost?

4. Establish a neutral expert system, train and quote real experts, including citing international experts in the demonstration and project monitoring and evaluation of some large-scale ecological projects. Scientists are not equal to capable experts, and experts cannot be tempted by their own academic interests. Experts should have profound knowledge (scientific thinking), social responsibility and independent thinking ability. In order to get the project, experts in China often become "department experts" who speak for the department, lacking the sense of social responsibility and independent thinking ability, so they have such "China characteristics": every wrong policy is often supported by well-known experts, and every project full of problems is always applauded by a group of experts.

5. Incorporate the protection of natural resources and ecological environment into the sustainable development management system and evaluation system, and "do it yourself" like family planning. At present, everyone will say that protection is important, but more often it is to ask the state for money and projects under the banner of protection, and it is rarely implemented or implemented in the wrong place. Especially in the western region, we should attach importance to ecological restoration and ecological environment protection at least as much as economic development, and formulate scientific, objective and targeted indicators to monitor, instead of "traditional" construction indicators and performance indicators such as afforestation area, fence construction and grazing prohibition area (afforestation area is not equal to forest, fence construction is not equal to grassland restoration, and grazing prohibition area is not equal to grass and livestock balance).

6. Existing ecological projects should be evaluated scientifically and neutrally, and revised on this basis. The question to be considered is: Is it necessary to continue to implement the "Three North" shelterbelt project? How to modify the project of returning grazing to grassland? How to treat the limitations of afforestation objectively and avoid its negative effects, instead of taking afforestation as a panacea? How to treat objectively the role of traditional nomadism in ecological protection and grassland maintenance? How to formulate a sustainable resource management policy suitable for the vast pastoral areas instead of copying the agricultural policies of the mainland to the vast pastoral areas? Is it necessary or appropriate to implement the project of returning farmland to forests in pastoral areas? If it is not implemented in pastoral areas, how to formulate ecological restoration projects suitable for grassland in pastoral areas? Is it appropriate to divide the original semi-shrub grassland into public welfare forests and enclose it? Wait a minute. In fact, as far as the current situation is concerned, we should immediately stop the blind large-scale enclosure, dismantle most of the barbed wire all over the grassland, stop the development of desert oases, not blindly advocate desert afforestation and tree planting and sand prevention in arid areas, and advocate moderate grazing instead of large-scale grazing prohibition.

7. It should be recognized that herdsmen are the main body of grassland management in pastoral areas. They have lived, maintained and protected grasslands for generations, and the sustainable utilization and management of grasslands has actually become an important part of their traditional culture. The policies and measures formulated by departments and scholars will seriously deviate from the actual situation and will not succeed in the end if there is no participation and support from the public opinion of grassland subjects. An academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences mentioned in his speech that "traditional animal husbandry (mainly nomadic) is extensive, backward and predatory", so it should be abandoned. In fact, traditional animal husbandry may be "backward", but it is the most frugal and environmentally friendly lifestyle. Just as driving a car is a modern and advanced lifestyle, we can't deny the "backward" way of riding a bike and walking. Traditional animal husbandry is necessary and even extremely important in western China. At present, the policy of "enclosure to grazing" in pastoral areas (grazing prohibition, herdsmen turning to concentrated production) has actually failed in a large number of cases. We can't continue to regard these failed projects with negative effects greater than positive effects as "the emperor's new clothes".

8. Any construction project in the arid area of northwest China, including ecological engineering construction and demonstration, must consider the water factor and water price. The actual value of water in arid areas of northwest China is much higher than that in inland areas. If the value consciousness and policy of inland water are applied to the northwest region, it is wrong and will lead to the consequences of ecological deterioration. Whether it is agricultural production or other project activities, we should consider adding "water resources compensation fee" in the arid areas of northwest China. Take agricultural production as an example. At present, agricultural water consumption in arid areas is largely at the expense of water resources exhaustion. Only by adding a similar "water resources compensation fee" can the cost of local agricultural production be truly reflected.

9. The establishment of ecological engineering must be scientifically demonstrated by the ecosystem approach, and ecological construction cannot be built unilaterally; The main mineral resources in China are mined in the west. At the same time, it is necessary to make a scientific, objective and neutral assessment of the possible ecological damage and degradation, formulate policies, plan and implement the ecological restoration of the degraded ecosystem caused by mining. Even if it is an ecological project, it is necessary to carry out environmental impact assessment on ecological construction projects, such as the ecological impact assessment of fence construction and afforestation projects.

In short, for the western region, we should first look at it from the perspective of the overall national strategy and the ecological, social and economic pattern, and weigh the advantages and disadvantages of ecological security and economic development: which is more important, western development or ecological protection? At present, the ecological service function of the west is much more important than that of the east, and the economy lags behind the east. How to weigh these two differences? Is it necessary to deliberately narrow the differences between East and West? Analyzing the ecological status of the western region and the economic status of the eastern region as a whole, perhaps "western development" is called "western sustainable development", which is more conducive to China's development strategy. (Tsinghua University Ecological Environmental Protection Research Center)