Experts, political advisers and people's congress deputies in south China's Guangdong Province have expressed concern over the area's rapidly dwindling mangroves. 

Liang Guozhao, a member of the Standing Committee of the Guangdong Provincial People's Political Consultative Conference, warned that mangroves witnessed a decline of 86 percent compared with several years ago and proposed urgent protective measures.

Huang Tao and Zhang Kai, both deputies to the Guangdong Provincial People's Congress, also suggested urgent attention be paid to the almost extinct mangroves after investigating Zhanjiang and Maoming, two coastal cities in Guangdong.

Expansion of ports, urban infrastructure construction and extensive development of the fishing industry are the main reasons in the degradation of mangroves, the deputies' reports say.

The rehabilitation of the mangroves tops the wetland protection agenda in Guangdong Province.

The province, one of the country's major homes of mangroves, a tropical and sub-tropical ecosystem, consisting of arbor and rose bushes, will plant about 50,000 hectares of mangrove along the coastal area, starting this year.

The plant, mainly found in Guangdong, Hainan, Hong Kong, and Taiwan and the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, is the major feature of the wetlands.

Sources with the provincial forestry authority said the coastal areas had more than 20,000 hectares of mangroves decades ago. Now only some 3,400 hectares are left.

It means that a large varieties of mesic birds will lose their habitat and breeding places.

"It's urgent to protect the mangrove wetlands," said He Zhijun, director of the wildlife protection office with the Guangdong Provincial Forestry Bureau.

He estimated that the plan for massive mangrove plant may cost more than 100 million yuan (US$12 million).

(China Daily August 13, 2004)