Soaring coverage

"Thanks to the greening efforts, China's forest coverage soared from 12 percent in the 1980s to 22.96 percent last year. By then, the country had 220 million hectares of forests, of which 80 million hectares were artificial," said Jin Min, director of the Natural Forest Protection Office at the State Forestry and Grassland Administration.

In the area of the Three-North Shelterbelt Program alone, forest coverage rose from 5 percent in 1977 to 13 percent in 2017, reclaiming 336,000 square kilometers of desertified land.

As a result of the program, the average number of sandstorm days has fallen from 6.8 per year to 2.4. Last year, the program was recognized with the "Good Practice of UNSPF" (the UN Strategic Plan for Forests 2017-2030) award by the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs.

The rising forest coverage has driven environmental improvements. For example, the sand content of the entire Yangtze River fell by 90 percent from 2000 to 2016, and eight provinces enjoyed an average forest coverage rate of 50 percent. Fujian province took top spot with nearly 67 percent of its land covered by forests.

Wildlife has also benefited from the program, according to Li Shuming, deputy head of the State Forestry and Grassland Administration. In Hainan province, the number of Hainan gibbons-a critically endangered species-rose from just seven in 1998 to 29 last year.

Li added that the number of Wild Siberian Tigers in Northeast China has risen from 10 in 1998 to 42, while a North Chinese Leopard, a species that disappeared from surveillance records in the 1970s, was recently seen close to Beijing.