Sino-German Afforestation Program FruitfulSome 20,000 hectares of forests have been grown with the Sino-German afforestation program in central China's Dongting Lake Area, completing 65 percent of the set task.According to local sources, the Sino-German cooperation project was formally launched by Hunan Province and the German Bank of Reconstruction in February 1998. The project is being carried out in eight counties of Changde, Yiyang and Yueyang cities, all in Hunan Province, and is part of the protection forest belt planted along the upper and middle reaches of the Yangtze River. The program is also designed to protect and improve ecological environment of the related areas, reduce soil erosion and damages by floods, and increase local farmers' income by way of growing trees, said the sources. The German bank provided a grant of 12 million DM for the project which will be carried out in eight years including five years in growing trees and three years in tending. |
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