A Russian-Chinese cross-border reserve named Land of Big Cats has been established in the Russian Far East to protect tigers and leopards.
The agreement on the creation of a reserve was signed by the Minister of Natural Resources and Ecology of Russia Alexander Kozlov and the head of the State Administration of Forestry and Steppe Economy of China Guan Zhiou.
The signing took place in the presence of Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping.
The new reserve includes the Russian Land of the Leopard National Park and the Cedar Gorge Nature Reserve, as well as the Chinese Northeast Tiger and Leopard National Park. These specially protected natural territories touch along the 280-kilometer-long state border. The area of the protected area on the Russian side is 500,000 hectares, and on the Chinese side — more than 1.4 million hectares.
The borders of these territories will remain unchanged, the main task of the reserve is to combine efforts to preserve rare felines included in the Red Book.
Currently, 58 tigers and 129 leopards live in the Land of the Leopard and Cedar Gorge.
In addition to preserving the populations of the Amur tiger and the Far Eastern leopard, the important tasks of the reserve will be the prevention of offenses, including the fight against poaching, the prevention of forest fires on the border and the development of international eco-tourism.
Alex Shishlo, Editor in Chief of the European bureau, Rough&Polished
