The Chinese have become increasingly concerned about the
environment as the country continues on its fast-track path of
economic and social development.
Millions of volunteers are joining hands with a growing number
of non-profit organizations and playing a bigger role in the
environment protection drive that is taking shape throughout the
nation.
"Helping nature, our unique home, by doing voluntary work is
becoming a natural choice for more and more ordinary Chinese
people," says Ding Yuanzhu, director of the Research Center for
Volunteering and Welfare under Peking University.
"There is a growing recognition in China of the impact of civil
participation and the benefits of volunteering," Ding says.
The news of some 100 volunteers collecting rubbish earlier this
month on Mount Qomolangma, the world highest peak, has occupied
many newspapers' headlines lately.
The volunteers called on visitors to leave nothing behind but
their footprints and good memories.
In recent years, the waste and pollution on the mountain has
been growing by 45 tons annually. To prevent further pollution, the
group cleared waste left on the area higher than 6,500 meters above
sea level.
Environmental volunteers have left their footprints in recent
years in the most remote and harsh areas where lie many natural
reserves and protection zones.
Every year since 2002, the Hoh Xil Nature Reserve in northwest
China's Qinghai
Province home to the endangered Tibetan antelope has seen
dozens of volunteers arriving from other parts of the country to
provide a helping hand with conservation.
More than 150 volunteers, aged from 18 to 45, have participated
in patrols, checking passing vehicles for evidence of poaching, and
distributing antelope protection handbooks to locals during their
month-long voluntary work in the past two years, says Cai Ga,
director of the Hoh Xil Nature Reserve Administration.
Chen Xiaomin, 44, a volunteer from east China's Jiangxi
Province, says: "We hope that our work can increase public
awareness of the need to protect the environment and endangered
animals."
Along with nine other volunteers from other parts of the
country, Chen has just finished a one-month voluntary service stint
with the reserve in late June, often working in protection stations
more than 4,700 meters above sea level.
Living conditions there are harsh. Vegetables and meat are all
sent from Golmud, a city 430 kilometers away, Chen explains.
Although they are faced with a hard life, many Chinese
volunteers are determined to continue their invaluable work.
Ding from Peking University says to better serve nature,
volunteers need to learn how to protect themselves and acquire more
survival skills.
"A great deal remains to be done if volunteering is to achieve
its potential including fund raising and program development," Ding
adds.
Many non-governmental and non-profit organizations, including
some overseas organizations, are responding to this urgent
need.
The US-based Pacific Environment and Global Green Grants Fund
provide small grants to over 50 grassroots organizations around
China annually.
"We aim to bring Chinese environmental activists together to
learn from each other's experiences and to develop cooperative
campaigns, maximizing the groups' environmental impact," said Wen
Bo, China director of Pacific Environment.
"College students are full of passion and always eager to become
environmental volunteers, but they need guidance and training from
professional environmentalists and green organizations," Wen
says.
It is reported that more than 1 million students from more than
100 universities and colleges across the country have become
volunteers to protect the environment.
Students at the Beijing Forestry University introduced a garbage
recycling system to their dormitories two years ago, the first of
its kind on campus in China.
In Nanjing, capital of East China's Jiangsu Province, students
have taken sample water from different sections of the polluted
Qinhuai River which runs through the city, and have shown them to
local residents to promote environmental protection awareness.
Students at Fudan
University in Shanghai, Lanzhou University in northwest China's
Gansu Province, and elsewhere helped local people fill out cards
committing themselves to help protect the environment.
These environmentalists are having an immense impact not only on
China's ecological health, but also on Chinese society as a whole.
As the country prepares for the 2008 Beijing Olympics, which the
capital has promised to be a "green" one, China's environmental
community is at an important crossroads.
A recent survey conducted by the Peking University Volunteer
Center suggests the estimated population of Chinese aged 18 and
older, who volunteered their time, skills and energy, hit more than
769 million annually, helping improve their community and the
environment.
(China Daily October 4, 2004)