During ecotourism year of 1999, China had promoted 10 types of ecotourism, including bicycle touring, desert exploring, natural ecological investigation and so on, covering 193 attraction sites in all over the country.
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China is a country which has the most abundant tourist resources. It is proved that Chinese tourism began in the period of Shun, flourished in Tang and Song Dynasties. While as an industry, it is almost new in China. The establishment and development of forest parks provide the society with many kinds of tourist activities, such as sightseeing, vacation, body-building, scientific investigation and exploring.
During ecotourism year of 1999, China had promoted 10 types of ecotourism, including bicycle touring, desert exploring, natural ecological investigation and so on, covering 193 attraction sites in all over the country. Besides, the National Tourism Administration developed a series of tourist zones, including oceans, mountains, deserts, grassland, tropic animals and plants, etc. Up to now, our ecotourism has developed to demi-manmade ecological scenery from originals. And the tourist objects contain weald, glacier, natural reserves and rural landscape, and the main tourist types are sightseeing, scientific investigation, exploring, hunting and fishing and so on.
Now, several ecotourist zones have been opened, like forest parks, scenic spots and natural reserves. The earlier developed regions contain Shangri-la, Xishuang Banna, Changbai Mountain, Lanchuang River, etc. According to different types of tourist zones, our famous attractions can be divided into 9 parts. The first are mountains. The representatives are five sacred mountains, four Buddhist holy .jpg)
mountains, Taoist mountains. The second are lakes. The representatives are lakes of Changbai Mountain, Star Lake of Zhaoqing, Qinghai lake of Qinghai Province. The third are forests. The representatives are forest of Changbai Mountain, Shenlongjia of Hubei Province, Xishuang Banna of Yunnan Province. The fourth are grasslands. The representative is Hulun Buir grassland of Inner Mongolia. The fifth are oceans. The representatives are North Sea of Guangxi Province and Mangrove Coast of Hainan Province. The sixth are bird appreciations. The representatives are bird natural reserves of Poyang Lake in Jiangxi Province and Bird Island of Qinghai Lake. The seventh are Snow Mountains. The representatives are Jade Dragon Snow Mountain of Yunnan Province and Changbai Mountain of Jilin Province. The eighth are drift zones. The representative is Shenlongjia of Hubei Province. The last are exploring zones. The representatives are Mount Qomolangma, Lop Nor Desert and Yaluzangbu Grand Valley.
However, at present, many ecotourist zones only focus on returning to the nature, ignoring the target of protecting it. Therefore, some points must be clear. The real ecotourism should be an enjoyable activity on the basis of environmental protection. And this must rely on scientific planning and management. It needs the cooperation and efforts of governors, tourists, tour guides and operators.