Ground was broken yesterday on a new bicycle and pedestrian path that will encircle Dianchi Lake and will be off limits to motorized vehicles, according to Kunming media reports.

The so-called "Dianchi Landscape Path" (环滇池景观道) will be a total of 75.75 kilometers (47 miles) long. In addition to offering views of the heavily polluted, occasionally miasmatic but generally scenic Dianchi Lake, the path will also be accompanied by a landscaped green belt. It is scheduled for completion within two years.

The path's construction comes at a time when fewer Kunming residents are riding bicycles and more are driving their own cars or riding electric bicycles. Not so long ago, a two-day bicycle ride around the lake on the roads encircling Dianchi Lake was a popular weekend getaway for university students to get some exercise, or more often, for young lovers to escape from the lack of privacy of dorm life.

Today, local media often refers to Kunming as Ducheng (堵城), loosely meaning "Congestion City", as cars have taken over the city. Car ownership rates are climbing quickly and at last count more than 560 motorized vehicles were being registered in the city each day.

With most of the city's road resources being mobilized to deal with more and more cars, the Dianchi Landscape Path is a rare investment in Kunming's cycling and pedestrian infrastructure.

Not surprisingly, the path's construction is the lesser half of the 8.8 billion yuan (US$1.3 billion) "Two Rings" construction project that also includes renovation of Huanhu Lu (环湖路), the road that encircles Dianchi Lake, which will be constructed into an eight-lane highway.

Image: ncic.ac.cn

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Despite being landlocked, Yunnan has plenty of water, including the headwaters of the Yangtze, Mekong and Salween Rivers. It is also home to nine large lakes, with Kunming's Dianchi Lake (滇池) the biggest of the group.

Dianchi Lake is also famous for being heavily polluted – to the point where its water is unfit for industrial use. Yunnan's polluted lake club has recently added a new member – Yangzonghai Lake (阳宗海) – which the provincial government announced has heavy levels of arsenic in its waters. Yangzonghai is now officially considered unfit for drinking, swimming in or fishing in.

The arsenic discovery came during a snap inspection of enterprises operating in the Yangzonghai basin 45 kilometers east of Kunming, with eight companies found to be engaging in illegal polluting practices. Yunnan Chengjiang Jinye Industrial and Trade Co Ltd (云南澄江锦业工贸有限公司) has been named as the main polluter.

The company allegedly failed to build the legally required treatment facility for its wastewater, with years of accumulated arsenic seeping into the local water table. Yunnan Communist Party Secretary Bai Enpei (白恩培) and Yunnan Governor Qin Guangrong (秦光荣) have pledged to take "decisive action" to remedy the situation.

As recently as 2002, Yangzonghai had been noted for having water clean enough for drinking and swimming – a stark contrast to the environmental devastation of nearby Dianchi Lake. In February of this year, Kunming Communist Party Secretary Qiu He (仇和) visited Yangzonghai, warning local enterprises that the lake must not become a "second Dianchi".

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One of the most biologically diverse regions in China and the world, Yunnan province is home to a disproportionate amount of China's animal species – many of which are endangered. According to the Yunnan Provincial Environmental Protection Bureau, Yunnan is home to more than 59 percent of China's endangered animal species.

Not surprisingly, most of landlocked Yunnan's endangered animals such as the red panda, the Yunnan golden monkey, Asian elephant and the black crested gibbon are terrestrial creatures. However, Yunnan is covered with lakes of varying sizes and altitudes – these lakes also contribute to the province's biodiversity.


Unfortunately, many of the fish species found in Yunnan's lakes – many of which are only found in Yunnan – are also endangered, primarily due to overfishing and pollution, especially pesticide runoff. Yunnan's lakes are home to 60 species found nowhere else in the world.

The Chinese Academy of Sciences and Kunming Institute of Zoology (KIZ) recently released a joint appeal to protect the remaining fish species indigenous to Yunnan. Surprisingly, many of these alpine fish species can only be found in pools located within the thousands of Buddhist temples throughout the province.

For example, according to a study by KIZ – a branch of the Chinese Academy of Sciences – all 25 indigenous fish species in Dianchi Lake are extinct within the lake itself but still exist in the pools of Buddhist compounds bordering the lake. Dianchi is Yunnan's largest lake and the sixth-largest freshwater lake in China.

In an unusual mix of religion and environmental protection, the KIZ report calls upon provincial authorities to protect the pools at Buddhist temples in the area and the fish which populate them. As Xinhua puts it:

"On the basis of the survey, the shrines should be made a protection sites for rare and indigenous aquatic life and protective measures should be drafted in an early date. And a publicity drive has to be launched so as to beef up the public's awareness of the conscious protection and all society's participation."

Dragon pool image: Xinhua

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Yunnan province announced plans this week to spend 30 billion yuan (US$4.29 billion) over the next three years addressing the pollution of Dianchi Lake, China's sixth-largest freshwater lake and the largest lake on the Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau.

Qin Guangrong, governor of Yunnan, described the cleanup work on Dianchi as 'top priority' for building a modern Kunming – which borders the lake on its northeast - according to a Xinhua report. Qin said the project consists of six sub-programs, including pollution interception along the 29 rivers that feed into the lake, plus "ecological protection, dredging, and others". Several wastewater treatment plants will also be built under the project.

Also part of the plan is a scheme to resettle approximately 30,000 lakeside residents in an attempt to restore wetlands in the area by 2010, the report said. Yunnan has spent billions of dollars on reducing pollution in the 300-square-kilometer lake with little to show for it in terms of results. China's major lakes, including Dianchi, Taihu and Chaohu, are suffering from algae blooms that are destroying the lake ecosystems by depleting the water's oxygen content. The central government aims to return the lakes to their 'original state' by 2030.

The announcement by Governor Qin follows recent commercial interest in cleaning up Dianchi. Last year Hong Kong-listed property developer Shui On Land announced that it intended to "thoroughly restore" Dianchi as part of its Caohai Urban North Shore project. The project will dedicate 87 hectares to a mix of high-, medium- and low-density housing and 29 hectares to cultural infrastructure including museums, theaters, an amphitheater and an "artist's community".

According to a Shui On press release, the plan involves a short-term strategy of creating a lake "cell" isolated from the rest of the lake and filling it with clean water. Once the lake has reached a level of recreational cleanliness, the lake cell and the lake will be combined.

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Media coverage of China's preparation for the 2008 Olympic Games has focused almost entirely on the host city of Beijing. It's understandable: That is where the Bird's Nest and the Water Cube are, where the huge crowds will show up in August, where decisions are being made now about what athletes will eat and how venues will be kept safe.

Flowers and Football at Hongta

Kunming has been playing a major, if much quieter, role in China's preparation for the games. The elevation of 1,900 meters, year-round temperate climate and significantly cleaner air than Beijing make Kunming an ideal place for sports training - in fact, the city has been China's national high-elevation training base for more than 30 years.

Kunming's two major training complexes - Hongta Sports Center and Haigeng Training Base - have been a beehive of sports activity, and should only get busier as the Olympics draw near.

"We will be very busy between now and the Olympics," said Zhang Tianyou, general director at Haigeng National Training Center in Kunming.

We went out to Haigeng recently to have a look around. The trip gave us a glance at an important but little-known place in China's sports world, and resulted in a precious opportunity get on the pitch with the women's football team.

Haigeng National Training Center

The diving well at Haigeng National Training Center

Haigeng is the official national training center and with its boxy cement buildings and iron-barred windows, the 35-year-old complex looks the part of an old Communist sports factory. The sprawling campus includes eight hardwood basketball courts, weight rooms, indoor and outdoor tennis courts, a dozen football pitches, two running tracks, a pool for swimming and one for diving. It also has a large snooker hall, a room for table tennis and a volleyball gym. Tucked away in one corner, Haigeng even has a pair of disused baseball diamonds, a rare sight in China.

Haigeng's setting on Dianchi Lake, past Kunming's award-winning Lakeview Golf Club and an abundance of spiffy new condominium developments, is quiet and clear-skied, and relatively isolated. As professional tennis player Yanina Wickmayer said after playing in a match at Haigeng in November, the location can be both good and bad for athletes.

"The facilities are nice, but it's out here in the middle of nowhere," Wickmayer said. "But that could be good if you're trying to really focus on your training for a little while."

Athletes, coaches and team managers stay onsite in the complex's many dormitories and hotel rooms.

Hongta Sports Center

If Haigeng calls to mind the China of 20 years ago, Hongta Sports Center is a gleaming US$58 million monument to China's future hopes. Just 10 minutes' drive from Haigeng, Hongta was built in 2000 by the Hongta cigarette company, a major economic driver for Yunnan province. While Haigeng is used almost exclusively by professional athletes, Hongta doubles as a sports club for the general public. The general public can use all of its extensive facilities and every weekend, it hosts amateur football matches.

The world-class Hongta pool

Aside from about 10 football pitches, including one surrounded by a running track, Hongta also has a 50-meter swimming pool with a water slide (which seems to always be out of commission), a badminton gymnasium, tennis courts and a basketball court. It also has one of China's few ice hockey rinks, and a workout room with treadmills and weightlifting machines. Athletes can unwind between workouts in a large game room full of air hockey and pool tables, or in the basement bowling alley. Hongta also has a 101-room hotel and restaurant.

For more China sports news, check out China Sports Today

Tags: Bird's Nest, Dianchi Lake, Haigeng National Training Center, Hongta Sports Center, Lakeview Golf Course, Olympic training, sports, Water Cube

Hong Kong-listed Shui On Land announced that it will invest 5 billion yuan (US$695.8 million) in a tourism-focused development project based in the travel hotspot of Shangri-la, located in northwest Yunnan's Diqing Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture.

According to Chinese financial media reports, Shui On has signed an agreement with the Diqing government to develop a plot of land with a total area of 17.73 million square meters – 9.96 million square meters of which it is designating 'protected areas' – into a 'holiday and leisure area'.

The development project, which currently has a planned building area of 760,000 square meters, will be surrounded by a ring of 3.49 million square meters of undeveloped land as a buffer between it and the outside world.

Shui On, known best for its high-end office, residential and commercial projects in Shanghai, Hangzhou and other mainland cities, has been making steady inroads into the Yunnan market.

In September of 2007, the company co-signed an agreement with the Yunnan government in which the two parties vowed to work together to develop Yunnan's bountiful tourism resources. The developer has already signed agreements for major developments on Dianchi's north shore in Kunming as well as in Dali's Haidong New District. In addition to Shangri-la, Shui On has also expressed interest in development projects in Lijiang.

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Will Erhai Lake bounce back?

The People's Government of Dali has banned all fishing activities on Erhai Lake from January 1 of this year "in order to guarantee Erhai's ecological recovery and the sustainable development of the fishing industry", according to a Yunnan Daily report.

Not unlike Dianchi Lake in Kunming, Erhai Lake has seen its water quality drop severely in the last couple of decades, especially with the rapid development of Xiaguan (aka 'New Dali') and its accompanying pollution.

Pollution plus heavy fishing have taken a toll on the quality and quantity of fish in the lake. There is also a tourist element to fishing on Erhai Lake, as many foreign and domestic tourists make it out to witness a traditional local fishing method using cormorants.

The Dali government also declared that the 2.1-square kilometer Erhai Aquatic Life Protected Area between Hong Mountain and Ao Mountain in Shuanglang Town will be closed to the public for the entire year.

Tags: Dali, Dianchi Lake, environment, Erhai Lake, fish, Shuanglang, Xiaguan

The end of the year is a special time in which editors and writers around the world recycle content from the previous twelve months and repackage it as new content. We at GoKunming are not above this practice, so here's our look at the people and events that shaped 2007 in Kunming and Yunnan.

January
Internet access in Kunming and around Asia was severely limited after a late-December earthquake in Taiwan severed some rather important undersea cables to North America. Normal or near-normal access was quickly restored to China's coast and elsewhere around Asia, but more remote places such as Yunnan province were forced to wait until February for normal internet access to be restored.

Kunming native Jin Feibao hiked to the South Pole, only to discover that it was already an American city.

Yunnan First People's Provincial Hospital and the Xishan Public Security Bureau opened China's first drunk tank for foreigners, citing increased numbers of 'drunken incidents' involving foreigners.

February
The popular American pseudo-Chinese restaurant chain PF Chang's Chinese Bistro launched a special 'Flavors of Yunnan' menu that ran from Chinese New Year to September at more than 130 locations across the US. Although it was difficult to not be critical of the menu's lack of authenticity, it seemed to be a promising indicator that the unique dishes and cooking styles found in Yunnan were beginning to be noticed by the outside world.

A down-on-his-luck businessman in Fumin County near Kunming got his 15 minutes of fame for painting a mountain green in order to improve the mountain's fengshui with the hope of improving his personal fortunes as well. The mountain which had been quarried for 20 years was covered with nearly half a billion yuan's worth of bright green paint over 45 days.

Yunnan province was singled out for praise by UK medical journal The Lancet for its efforts in combating the spread of HIV/AIDS. In terms of HIV/AIDS infections, Yunnan has been one of the more harder-hit regions of China and is where China's first case of HIV/AIDS was reported in 1985. The Lancet said that Yunnan "has shown strong support for implementation and advocacy of harm-reduction strategies that reduce HIV transmission in its many drug users".

March
A great place for hiking, biking and navel gazing, the sleepy town of Dali inched a little bit closer to Kunming with the completion of the new Kunming-Dali highway. The new road reduced travel time between Kunming and Dali to around four hours – not much longer than the total time required for someone living in downtown Kunming to fly to Dali.

Following in the footsteps of the town of Zhongdian in northwest Yunnan – which was officially renamed 'Shangri-la', the city of Simao was renamed Pu'er with the hope of cashing in on the boom in interest in pu'er tea. Unfortunately, Pu'er was hit by a major earthquake a few months later.

April
The Mekong River, which flows out of China via Yunnan, was drying up in its lower reaches in Southeast Asia. Water levels as low as one meter on the border of Laos and Thailand made river travel or transport all but impossible for much of April. The low levels were attributed to a combination of an intense dry season and the completion of two dams – Manwan and Dachaoshan – on the Lancang River, as the Mekong is known in Yunnan.

Yunfest 2007, perhaps the best documentary festival in China, was cancelled under a shroud of rumor and confusion. GoKunming hopes to see the festival back in Kunming in 2009.

Kunming's re-emergence as the center of Asia made progress as India began rebuilding its section of the Stilwell Road and overland transport agreements between China and Vietnam streamlined the movement of goods and people between Yunnan and Vietnam. Border wars with India in 1962 and Vietnam in 1979 led to long periods of icy relations between the two countries and China. With the return of relative political and economic stability to most of East Asia, Southeast Asia and South Asia, Yunnan appears poised to become a hub for commerce, politics and transport between the three dynamic regions.

May
Kunming hosted China's 7th National Disabled Games, a major test for the city, which is keen to host more international events. In general the games were well-managed and inspiring to disabled and non-disabled attendees alike. One of the more popular events was blind soccer (football) - check out this video clip to see how they do it.

June
June was both a good and bad month for Kunming's image as the Kunming Fair totaled US$150 million in completed deals and Kunming was named China's 'Solar City' as well as one of China's 'rising urban stars'. Slightly less positive, nearby Dianchi Lake made an appearance in domestic and international media as its waters turned bright green from an algae outbreak.

July
Kunming became one of the first Chinese cities with a 'drive-thru' McDonald's. The old town of Lijiang began charging an 80 yuan entry fee as UNESCO warned China that some of its World heritage sites in Yunnan were designated for 'examination' due to concerns regarding development and tourism (Lijiang) and damming (Three Parallel Rivers Protected Areas).

Yunnan's rainy season inflicted heavy damage provincewide as dozens of people died and thousands were displaced by heavy rains and flooding.

August
Former Kunming Deputy Mayor Hu Xing was sentenced to life in prison for bribery after being extradited from Singapore to Kunming. Hu, who allegedly took more than 40 million yuan in bribes while in office, was in charge of Kunming's roads and highways for several years, which may partially explain the dismal state of Kunming traffic.

Food prices in Yunnan were rising quickly, causing concern for workers and business owners around the province, and pu'er tea was leading all luxury goods in China in terms of price growth.

September
Kunming held its first no-car day in which only buses and taxes were allowed to operate within the city center. The city later became China's first city with regular no-car days - although the no-car day on December 29 was apparently forgotten.

Starbucks announced that it would begin sourcing coffee beans from Yunnan amid rumors that Starbucks outlets would come to challenge Kunming's homegrown café scene in 2008.

October
China's rock godfather Cui Jian headlined the Lijiang Snow Mountain Music Festival just weeks before the first Kunming Outdoor Music Festival was held in Anning.

Yunnan announced major changes to its resident registration system, during 2008 it will be seen what impact the changes will have upon rural migrants moving to cities around the province.

November
While much of northwestern Yunnan was snowed under, Kunming hosted its first-ever international film festival as well as China's largest travel expo, and it was announced that Kunming would be the site of the first war games between the Chinese and Indian armies.

December
Kunming was hit by a major gasoline shortage which disrupted life for many city residents and companies. GoKunming readers selected their favorite places to eat, drink and play in Kunming in the Best of Kunming 2007 awards.

And as a nice year-end gesture, the Chinese government officially scrapped its plans to dam Tiger Leaping Gorge… more about that next year.

The GoKunming team thanks everyone who visited the site in 2007 and wishes all of its readers a happy, healthy and bountiful 2008.

Tags: 2007, 2008, Cui Jian, Dali, Dianchi Lake, food prices, foreigner drunk tank, gasoline shortage, HIV/AIDS, Hu Xing, internet access, Jin Feibao, Kunming Fair, Lijiang, Lijiang Snow Mountain Music Festival, McDonald's, Mekong River, National Disabled Games, no-car days, PF Chang's, Pu'er, Shangri-la, Starbucks, Stilwell Road, The Lancet, Three Parallel Rivers Protected Areas, war games, Yunfest