Aerial photo taken on Aug. 9, 2020 shows the scenery in Saihanba National Forest Park in Chengde, north China's Hebei Province. (Photo by Liu Mancang/Xinhua)
SHIJIAZHUANG, Feb. 26 (Xinhua) -- North China's Hebei province raised its forest stock volume to 175 million cubic meters from 144 million cubic meters over the past five years, said the provincial forestry and grassland bureau on Friday.
From 2016 to 2020, Hebei completed some 2.63 million hectares of afforestation. It has also set the goal of afforesting 400,000 hectares of land in 2021, a part of which will happen near the 2022 Winter Olympics competition areas.
The province also restored over 181,000 hectares in the past five years. It made the comprehensive vegetation coverage of grasslands 73 percent, 17 percentage points higher than the national average.
The increase in vegetation can be attributed to a spate of government-led ecological projects such as afforestation on the mountains. The province will put forward more incentive programs and policies to encourage more people to participate in greening. ■