China plans national park network for 2020

China has released a plan to set up a system of national parks by 2020 to protect its fragile natural environment from construction, mining and pollution, the South China Morning Post reports. The parks will come under a unified management system designed to protect areas of outstanding natural beauty in China, according to a government plan released on Tuesday. People living in areas that will be designated national parks under the plan will be gradually relocated to other areas, the report said. Compared with many other countries, China has been slow to set up national parks to protect fragile ecosystems from being damaged by human activities such as logging, illegal mining, releasing pollutants, construction and poaching wildlife. Any such activity that damages the environment will be banned within the new national parks. China’s first trial national reserve, Sanjiangyuan, was set up in April in the remote Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in the west of the country.