Business
22:25, 10-Dec-2017
Poverty relief in Tibet - Episode three: The green power
["china"]
Share
Copied
Kunchok works as a forest ranger in Maizhokunggar county in the east Lhasa region of southwest China’s Tibet Autonomous Region. He works five days every month. When he is on duty, Kunchok and four other team members patrol the forest near one of the county's villages. When they see someone trying to start a fire or throwing away garbage or cutting down trees in the forest, they stop them.
There are another 1,081 forest rangers like Kunchok in Maizhokunggar county. On average, each of the rangers looks after 2379 mu of forest, which equals to about 220 soccer fields. Their average annual income is 11,000 yuan (1,661 US dollars).
CGTN photo
CGTN photo
The forest ranger program was launched in Tibet in 2004, and since then, more than 2.1 million people have benefited from the program. After the targeted poverty relief policies were implemented, the job hired more people from poor households. The project created 140,466 jobs across Tibet in 2016, lifting a lot of people out of poverty in the process.
Not only does the policy help reduce the number of people in poverty, it also benefits the environment in Tibet. The forest has been steadily growing since 2004, and biodiversity has also been greatly boosted. This is one of the examples that prove “lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets.”
2483km