Xinhua Silk Road: NE. China’s Harbin city is becoming a popular summer tourism destination
Xinhua Silk Road: NE. China’s Harbin city is becoming a popular summer tourism destination thanks to its rich wetlands
BEIJING , July 28, 2024 / — Harbin city in northeast China’s Heilongjiang Province has become a popular tourist destination this summer and boasts rich wetlands.
Since the beginning of July, search volume for “wetlands” in Harbin on Chinese e-commerce platform Meituan has increased 23% year-on-year, with the number of related travel tips increasing 151% year-on-year, according to Meituan data.
According to Zhang Huan , the park’s director, the number of tourist visits to the wetland at the mouth of the Hulan River has increased significantly recently, reaching about 5,000 visitors on weekends.
The park prioritizes the conservation of the wetland ecosystem while offering visitors a wide range of sports and recreational activities.
As one of the Chinese cities certified as “international wetland cities,” Harbin has stepped up its efforts to conserve and restore wetlands.
It has implemented the medium- and long-term wetland protection plan (2019-2035) and formulated wetland protection measures, a work plan for the ecological conservation and restoration of wetlands, and an implementation plan for the enforcement of the national wetland protection law to ensure law-based protection measures to improve the quality of wetlands, said Xing Guangyou, director of the wetland and nature reserve management department of the Harbin municipal forestry and grassland administration.
The wetland parks have established corresponding management mechanisms. For example, the Alejin Island National Wetland Park has implemented a wetland protection system, a wildlife protection and rescue system, a water quality monitoring and management system, etc. The national-level wetland park covers an area of 419 hectares, of which 71.1% is wetland.
Through years of efforts, Harbin has restored more than 3,000 hectares of wetlands and converted 685 hectares of farmland into wetlands.
Harbin’s success in protecting wetlands has paid off. About a million tourists visit Harbin every year , bringing the city billions of yuan in revenue.
