“A living Chinese landscape painting”
Celebrating Earth Heritage
Zhangjiajie UNESCO Global Geopark is located in the Wulingyuan District of Zhangjiajie City, Hunan Province of China.
Zhangjiajie UNESCO Global Geopark is an integrated Geopark, with sandstone peak forest landforms predominating most of the area and karst caves, water bodies and other landforms covering the remaining terrain. The UNESCO Global Geopark also preserves many endangered animal and plant species and maintains an ancient biological gene pool reflecting the original state of a subtropical environmental system.
There are four scenic areas in the UNESCO Global Geopark, which are Zhangjiajie, Suoxiyu, Tianzishan and Yangjiajie, with 40 geo-heritage sites of national significance and 12 of international significance in good preservation. Since its establishment, the UNESCO Global Geopark has played a very important role in conserving geoheritage and eco-environment, popularizing geosciences knowledge and enhancing public science literacy.
Sustaining local Communities
Zhangjiajie UNESCO Global Geopark has been making long-term efforts to promote science popularization, provide education on local landscape and culture, and give wide publicity to the UNESCO Global Geopark’s geology, geomorphology, ecology, and human landscape and its related scientific knowledge. Scientists from research organizations and universities have been invited to conduct scientific investigations in the UNESCO Global Geopark and several geosciences-teaching and -research bases have been established jointly. The interpretation system about geosciences in the UNESCO Global Geopark has been continuously improved and more science popularization reading materials are provided. As a result, science popularization has gradually melted into the interpretation of tour guides and more tourists have been attracted into the geological museum of the UNESCO Global Geopark. All of these have greatly enhanced the understanding of the public about the evolutionary characters, rock bedding, geological structure and the other features of the UNESCO Global Geopark, and significantly promoted the scientific and sustainable development of the UNESCO Global Geopark.
