Liqiong Yang from Yunnan Provincial Environmental Cooperation Office provides technical support to Core Environmental Program for China since late 2007 firstly through specific assignments, and later as a technical assistant.

“As a regional cooperation, CEP allows dialogue and exchange of information at national level. Considering China, it has provided great flexibility and opportunities for Yunnan and Guangxi provinces to participate intensively”, she explains.

“The cooperation intensified the information exchange and cooperation on environment between Yunnan and our neighbours in the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS).  It has been a great opportunity for us to promote better environmental understanding and learning in the GMS”, she continues.

More attention to environment conservation

According to Liqiong Yang, Chinese government is increasingly paying more attention to environment conservation, and more investments are expected on environmental protection in the future. Yunnan is one of the ecologically richest while the least economically developed provinces in China.

Pressure from both development and conservation is heavy. Any irrational development can cause big environmental damage. Therefore, international experience would be very helpful in guiding decision makings. To achieve that, good example like CEP will be an effective way to make an impact and get new environmental investments by the Chinese government.

Yunnan pioneers in biodiversity corridors

Biodiversity corridor approach was first-ever explored in Yunnan of China through CEP-BCI, which made Yunnan the pioneer in the country in this regards. Meanwhile, in response to the national and provincial development strategy aiming to develop Yunnan as the gateway of China to South-East Asia, Yunnan’s CEP experience is a valuable asset which can be used for further building on the environmental cooperation within GMS countries.

As a long-term regional environmental cooperation, this program has created diverse capacity building opportunities for governmental officials and technical persons through regional workshops, field visits, project management and technical training not only for the environmental sector, but also for sectors with close relationships with GMS environment conservation, such as tourism. Those opportunities are not only widened their views and knowledge, but also accelerate networking.

Capacity development in different levels

Through project implementation, Provincial Management Ofiice staff, partner agencies, governments of different levels and communities, as well as general public have benefited in terms of capacity development. For instance, for the local Environment Protection Bureau and governments of pilot sites, this is the first time of implementing international grant project. After struggling for some time, they have gradually understood the common international practice in implementing such a regional development project and also applied the project experience in their routine work. While for the communities, trainings and awareness raising activities tailored by the project have provided them the most needed community development and livelihoods development knowledge and techniques.

Close cooperation with GMS neighbors

Core Environmental Program is a regional program. Yang explains that Yunnan has received many groups to learn from Yunnan experiences and Yunnan delegations have benefited from visiting to some of the GMS countries. Besides, project implementing agencies or technical supporting staff of CEP in different countries also have met and discussed relevant issues in regional workshops.

In Xishuangbanna, joint conservation areas (cross-border conservation corridors) between China and Laos have been set up, and cooperation have been taking place gradually. Deeper cooperation with Laos and potential cooperation with Myanmar are to be explored.

Yunnan CEP-BCI was implemented by the Yunnan Environment Protection Bureau and local partners. All these organisations are very experienced in environment conservation. ”If there is a need from our neighbouring countries, we would be happy to provide support. Personally, I would be very delighted if my knowledge could be useful also outside of China”, she concludes.

Next steps

Workplan for the second phase includes partly similar components as the first phase. According to  Liqiong Yang the monitoring of corridor development will continue. This will include corridor demarcation, village development funds and ecological restoration, capacity building etc.

”These components will now be integrated at community level, for example we try to tackle problems related to solid waste management and waste water disposal”, she explains.

The Yunnan National Coordination Unit will also continue the capacity building activities and promote cross-border conservation between Laos and China.

Liqiong Yang, 40 Family: son (1 year old) and husband Graduated: Environmental Engineer in East China University of Science and Technology in Shanghai, M.Sc. Sustainable Natural Resource Management at Technical University of Munich in Germany Background: Currently Technical Assistant at the Yunnan Environmental Cooperation Office, China, Yunnan Institute of Environmental Science 1995-2001, DFID supported project Yunnan Environmental Development Program 2001-2004.