Birds fly, fish jump, and Chongming is fresh (the river flows-a report from the Yangtze River Economic Belt)

　　Chongming, the world’s largest estuarine alluvial island, acts as an ecological barrier for Shanghai, a megacity, where the Yangtze River enters the sea.

　　Beside Qingcaosha Reservoir in Changxing Island, one of Chongming Island, more than 700 mu of ecological forest separates the reservoir from the living and production area. All kinds of fry in the reservoir area thrive and the biodiversity is effectively protected. "This is not a stagnant pool, but a living ecosystem." Zhu Yiping, director of the Water Quality Center of Chongming Shanghai Chengtou Raw Water Company, said that this water area, which is equivalent to 10 West Lake in Hangzhou, provides clean drinking water sources for more than half of Shanghai’s population.

　　Chongming Dongtan is one of the eight major migration routes of birds in the world, with more than 1 million migratory birds inhabiting or transiting here every year. In the past, due to the destruction of wetland ecosystem, the species and number of birds decreased significantly. Since 2013, the ecological restoration project of Chongming Dongtan has been implemented in Shanghai to optimize the bird habitat within 24.2 square kilometers of the protected area. Reed, sea bream, etc. were gradually restored, and the degraded wetland ecosystem was improved. "The number of migratory birds migrating and transiting in 2017 was twice that of 2016." Observing this change, Yuan Lin, an associate researcher at the State Key Laboratory of Estuarine and Coastal Studies of East China Normal University, was pleasantly surprised.

　　East of Dongtan, the Chinese sturgeon, which is listed as a "critically endangered" protected species, is being carefully cared for. In the aquatic biological protection base here, Chinese sturgeons, large and small, have been rehabilitated or are multiplying. As the director of the management department of the Chinese sturgeon nature reserve in the Yangtze River Estuary of Shanghai, Liu Jian ‘ai said: "The Yangtze River ecology is good or not, not people, but fish." Up to now, the reserve has carried out more than 20 times of proliferation and release, and hundreds of thousands of rare aquatic organisms such as Chinese sturgeon and mullet of various specifications have been released.

　　It is necessary to let birds fly and fish swim, but also to make the lives of ordinary people rich and beautiful. More than 10 years ago, Shanghai made a decision to build Chongming Ecological Island, and rolled out a three-year action plan. In February 2017, Shanghai formulated and promulgated the "Thirteenth Five-Year Plan for the Development of Chongming World-class Ecological Island". The ecological construction station is higher, the principle of ecological island establishment is firmer, the concept of not engaging in large-scale development is more determined, and the direction of green development is more distinct.

　　Aiming at Chongming, a world-class ecological island, we will strive to build a new benchmark and demonstration area where people live in harmony with nature and give priority to ecological green development, explore environmental protection models and industrial development models that adapt to our own characteristics, and seize the key to sustainable ecological improvement and industrial development.

　　Over the years, Huang Shiying, a 68-year-old villager in Xincun Township, has seen the environmental changes. "In the past, the river was muddy, with a lot of weeds and garbage." Unexpectedly, there is Chongming’s first fixed-point delivery point for rural domestic waste at regular intervals near home. Through the mode of "household separation, household investment, rural transportation and rural disposal", the classified garbage is treated in a unified way.

　　In Sanxing Town, the purification tank behind the house of villager Huang Hanbin absorbed the domestic sewage of several villagers nearby. This is a low-cost sewage treatment equipment introduced by the town according to local conditions, which makes "the river water better and the flies and mosquitoes less". Once considered to be the most difficult to implement garbage sorting, Chongming District basically completed it in one year, and now it has achieved full coverage of garbage sorting.

　　The way of ecological priority and comprehensive improvement, Chongming is getting wider and wider. The development of eco-industry focusing on emerging industries such as urban modern green agriculture, eco-leisure tourism and marine equipment manufacturing is also booming.

　　Chongming has selected 10,000 mu of land in the whole region to carry out the production of "two-chemical-free" rice without chemical fertilizers and chemical pesticides. The first batch of new rice will be listed soon this year, and farmers are expected to increase their income by 20 million yuan. "Although the yield per mu will be much lower, we will build sales channels and win by quality." Shi Yuping, deputy general manager of Beihu Agricultural Development Co., Ltd. is very confident. In the future, Cuiguan pears, oranges and vegetables, which are "two-for-nothing", will also become the superior products of Chongming’s green agriculture.

　　In Changxing Town, east of Qingcaosha Reservoir, the marine equipment industry has begun to take shape. Changxing Town takes marine equipment and supporting, intelligent manufacturing industry as the development focus, and promotes intelligent production lines and green shipbuilding technology. Chongming has set the highest green development threshold in the city. On the one hand, it optimizes the negative list of industrial access, on the other hand, it guides the island’s industries to concentrate in the park, develops producer services that meet the requirements of ecological environment protection, and builds a demonstration area of green economy.

　　Good air can also be eaten as a meal. Today, Chongming Island attracts more and more tourists, with 3.25 million visitors in the first half of this year alone. With Chongming District being qualified to host the 10th China Flower Expo in 2021, this green ecological island near the river and the sea will be transformed into a colorful "flower island on the sea", showing the beauty of ecological harmony and the charm of green development, adding luster to Shanghai.