CAS is to greatly enhance its networks of field stations across
the country, with an objective of building them into a cluster of
highly open laboratories for research and long-term observation with
the state-of-the-art equipment, a demonstration base for the optimal
management of high technologies, and a key component of the earth-
monitoring system.
The announcement was made at a CAS conference on field stations
on June 6 in Lanzhou, capital of northwest China's Gansu Province.
The networks are an indispensable part of the national scientific
research and innovation system, stressed CAS President Lu Yongxiang
at the conference. It is also an important scientific ground for
continuously providing first-hand data and information for policy-makers
on issues concerning environment and natural resources.
In the coming five years, priority in this regard will be placed
on long-time studies, experiments and observations at fixed positions.
Efforts will be made to strengthen their long-time surveying capacities,
upgrading their abilities to carry out interdisciplinary research, and
remarkably improve their innovation capabilities in the fields of ecology,
modernized agriculture, resources and marine environment.
According to Prof. Fu Bojie, Director-general of the CAS Bureau of
Science and Technology for Resources and Environment, importance will be
attached to the development of various nationwide networks and sub-net
worksspecializing in urban ecology and regional ecosystems in east China,
atmosphere and climate monitoring, chain observatories on the solar-
terrestrial space environment, off-shore marine observation and research
network, stations for Qinghai-Tibet Plateau monitoring, large-scale joint
research on long-term ecological and environment experiments, automatic
observation and real-time and long-distance communication system, and an
integrated earth-observation system from space.
During the past half a century, CAS has set up more than 130 field
stations, specializing in geology, biology, space science, rock mechanics,
astronomy and acoustics, Among them, there are nearly 100 such stations
focus on resource, environment, ecology and agriculture, covering
representative regions across the land.
In 1988, CAS set up the Chinese Ecosystem Research Network (CERN),
which consists of the field research stations for various ecosystems,
including agriculture, forestry, grasslands and waterbodies. For years,
through its long-term monitoring, research and experiment, demonstration
and extension, it has served as an important facility to control
desertification, soil erosion, salinization, and eutrophication
