On January 29, 2021, Professor Shi Haitao, a member of the Key Laboratory of Tropical Island Ecology of the Ministry of Education and a provincial key discipline of ecology, published the article "China's turtles need protection in wild" (China urgently needs to protect the wild populations of turtles and turtles) in the form of merit in the main issue of science (science) magazine. This is the first time our school has published a paper in the journal Science.
This article is an academic paper jointly completed by Shi Haitao as a corresponding author, led by associate professor Wang Jian, a former master's and doctoral student, and Associate Professor Parham, an American scholar with whom he has 22 years of cooperation experience, based on their long-term research and concern for ecological protection.
Biodiversity is the foundation on which human beings depend for their survival and development. At present, global biodiversity is facing an unprecedented crisis that has endangered the sustainable development and survival of human beings, and there is an urgent need to strengthen protection to prevent the further deterioration of this situation. Effective, genuine conservation is about protecting the natural populations of species and their habitats, not turning them into captive individuals. Professor Shi Haitao has been committed to wildlife ecology and conservation research for more than 30 years, and on the basis of a large number of studies, he has found that there are many problems in the method of protecting endangered species through artificial breeding, and there have been many examples to prove the harm of aquaculture to protection. Therefore, Shi Haitao's team has been insisting on calling for the protection of wild populations.
There are two kinds of giant turtles in China, which are the largest turtles in the world, weighing up to 200 kilograms and the dorsal carapace up to 1.8 meters long. In "Journey to the West", the old shrews who crossed the Tongtian River by Tang Monks and apprentices refer to them, and the lepers mentioned by Jia Baoyu in "Dream of the Red Chamber" refer to them. These two species are the flagship species of turtles and turtles, with important historical, cultural, scientific and ecological conservation values. The Bamboo Book Chronicle records that King Mu of Zhou crossed the Jiujiang River, with the shrew as a beam, describing the number of shrews and Yangzi crocodiles as being able to build bridges. However, only one of the two species is known to be the Macula tortoise, which is currently kept in the Suzhou Zoo. The media and the public have lamented the species's irreparability of hopelessness. Another species of Asian round turtle has also been rarely seen in the wild for many years, and the rescue of this species is highly concerned by academics and the public.
My Government attaches great importance to the protection of this species and has taken active measures to rescue it. But there are different views on how to rescue. The paper emphasizes the need to learn the bitter lessons of the macular giant turtle and focus human, material and financial resources on the protection of wild populations and their habitats. After losing many large freshwater species such as the white sturgeon dolphin and the white sturgeon, the Chinese government has resolutely implemented the spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping's instructions on the construction of ecological civilization and is determined to fully implement a ten-year fishing ban policy in the Yangtze River Basin, but the rare creatures of other rivers are also facing serious threats. Therefore, the article proposes to extend the fishing ban to more other river basins in China; strengthen the management of aquatic biological reserves, establish and improve institutions, and provide stable funding guarantees; prohibit the construction of new engineering facilities in protected areas, and gradually dismantle existing hydropower stations. We may not be able to save the macular giant turtle, but we can make efforts to let other animals in China's wild rivers survive freely, and we should not put more efforts on artificial breeding, so as to improve the ecological environment governance system, improve governance capabilities, and build an ecological civilization.
Professor Shi Haitao
Shi Haitao published "China's turtles need protection in wild" in the form of merit in science magazine