Forestry authorities throughout China were urged to keep on high alert for forest fires in coming months as lingering dry weather and high temperatures have made forests tinder dry.
Zhou Shengxian, director of the State Forestry Administration (SFA), said forestry departments in the major forest regions of northeastern China and the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region in the north should pay special attention to fire prevention.
They were thought to be at higher risk of forest fires, particularly since they had experienced record low precipitation this Spring, Zhou told a meeting on fire prevention in Beijing Thursday.
China faced a greater challenge over fire prevention because the area of artificial forest had increased since the country launched several projects to conserve natural forests and plant more trees on mountain slopes, he said.
The SFA planned to send inspection teams to supervise and strengthen fire prevention in critical areas.
(Xinhua News Agency February 20, 2003)
