SW Province to Turn 150,000 Hectares of Farmland Into Forests ����Acting Governor Zhang Zhongwei announced in Chengdu on October 19 that Sichuan Province plans to turn 150,000 hectares of farmland into forests in the next two years. ����This is a new step taken by this southwestern province in response to the central government's efforts to curb severe soil erosion. Last year, the province initiated a program to protect local primitive forests. ����Sichuan, which covers half of the Yangtze River Basin, has the second-largest amount of forests among all provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions. ����Since the province began to forbid lumbering in the forests, crop-cultivation on hillsides with a slope of 25 degrees has been proved to the number one factor causing land erosion. ����Official figures show that 60 percent of the mud in river waters in China comes from hillside farming, which has forced the government to take action against soil erosion. (Xinhua) TopNews 1999-10-20 Page1 Full Story in Chinese