modification to the habitats of endangered and threatened species. Thus, China
- with a much larger number of endemic species than Taiwan – also has a far
greater number in the endangered and threatened columns. Four provinces out
of 27 in China (Jilin, Yunnan, Xinjiang, and Sichuan) are top priority with
respect to species preservation concerns, while Taiwan itself has fewer such
issues.
We also have examined briefly the ecosystems providing critical habitat to
endangered and threatened species, focusing on China. There is a direct
relationship between forest areas and biodiversity, and in China the forest
environment has been seriously challenged. Yet the forest ecosystem has
received great attention in the last decade, particularly since flooding of the
Yangtze in 1998 indicated the dangers of deforestation. China’s afforestation
programs represent a massive investment of resources and personnel into
biodiversity conservation. Wetlands and oceans have received much less
attention; only in the twenty-first century has the Chinese government begun
to develop policies to address degradation of these ecosystems.
Because natural scientists play critical roles in the identification of
endangered and threatened species and ecosystems, as well as in the mitigation
of risks, we considered briefly the national scientific establishments in China
and Taiwan. In the former, the CAS is developing expertise in the biological
sciences, and applying this expertise to biodiversity issues. While we cannot
say that science determines biodiversity policy in China, given the
uncertainties of species and ecosystem knowledge, it is clear that it informs
policy making. In Taiwan, we find a proportionately larger and better trained
scientific establishment, both in government and universities. However, as we
shall see later (in Chapter 8 especially), this does not mean that scientists have
greater influence than their peers in China on biodiversity policy.
In Chapter 4 we turn to the architecture of political institutions and
administrative agencies empowered to address the problems of species and
habitat endangerment identified here.
ENDNOTES
- Mackinnon, John, Mang Sha, Catherine Cheung, Geoff Carey, Zhu Xiang and David
Melville (1996), A Biodiversity Review of China, Hong Kong: World Wide Fund for Nature
(WWF) International, p. 39. The discussion follows their outline. - Ibid, p. 21. See also Li Fei (2000), ‘Evaluating species resources in China and their sustained
usage’ (in Chinese), Research and Evaluation in Traditional Chinese Medicine, 2 (12),
15–21, and Xu Haigen (1999), ‘Study and development of the China biodiversity meta-
database’ (in Chinese), Journal of Lanzhou University, 35 (4) (December), 103–08. - See Schei, Peter, Wang Sung, Xie Yan (compilers for CCICED) (2001), Conserving China’s
Biodiversity (II), 1997–2001, Beijing: China Environmental Science Press (2001), 10–11,
and Lu Yihe, Liding Chen, and Bojie Fu (2001), ‘Biodiversity resources: utilization,
conservation and management’ (in Chinese), Biodiversity Science, 9 (4), 422–29.
Current status of species and ecosystems 63