Qinghai Lake, China's biggest inland saltwater lake, will be gone in less than a decade if authorities do not cap the number of tourists flooding into the area on the Qinghai-Tibet Railway, a geographer warned yesterday.
'Once the lake is destroyed, it will be impossible for it to recover [ecologically] no matter how long you protect it,' said Shen Ji , of the Chinese Academy of Sciences' Nanjing Institute of Geography and Limnology.
Located in Qinghai province on the vast Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, the lake covers about 4,285 sq km and serves as a critical refuge for many endangered animals and plants. But since the 1960s, the nationally protected lake has been shrinking and becoming increasingly polluted.
'The water level has dropped 3.8 metres and the area shrunk by 670 sq km since the '50s,' Dr Shen said.
The Qinghai-Tibet Railway, which opened in July and passes along part of the lakefront, was expected to increase tourist numbers to the lake by more than 30 per cent annually over the next few years, a Qinghai Tourism Bureau official said yesterday. The official said about 8 million people were expected to visit the province this year and most would visit the famous lake.
Addressing a conference in Nanchang , Jiangxi province , Dr Shen said he was worried the sharp rise in visitors would lead to an increase in pollution.