World forest loss slows as China plants trees on a grand scaleThe world's net rate of forest loss has slowed markedly in the last decade, with less logging in the Amazon and China planting trees on a grand scale.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8586701.stm
According to Jia Zhibang, director of the State Forestry Administration, 47.11 billion trees have been planted across the country, the cumulate reserve area of man-made forests has topped 53 million hectares, the forest coverage rate has soared from 12 percent in the early 1980s to 18.21 percent today [with a target of 25% for 2020], and great progress has been made in the protection of wildlife and wetlands, as well as in the control of desertification.
http://chinaabc.showchina.org/chinaabc_en/magazine/recommendations/200704/t112004.htm
