BEIJING (AP) — China's unusually strong winter snow storms damaged 10 percent of the country's forests, leading to huge economic losses and widespread environmental destruction, the forestry administration said Tuesday.
Economic losses for the forest industry reached $8 billion, Vice Minister of the State Forestry Administration Zhu Lieke told a news conference. The storms hit some of China's best forest areas, and vital supplies for the timber industry, in southern China, he said.
"There's no doubt this natural disaster has caused great losses to the forestry resources in the southern part of China, but nationwide China's timber production capacity has not been fundamentally affected," he said.
Heavy ice and snow storms during January and through the Lunar New Year this month toppled trees, paralyzed much of China's rail and road transport, froze power grids and stranded hundreds of thousands of people heading home for the holiday.
Zhu said 46 million acres of forest from 19 provinces in southern China suffered from the snow disaster. Forests in Fujian, Jiangxi and Zhejiang provinces were hit the worst.
The timber production capacity of the disaster-struck areas will be "seriously affected" for three to five years, Zhu said.
Some companies that rely on bamboo and timber for raw materials will likely have to close, he said. But the government will use timber from damaged forests to meet the market demand this year to ensure stable supply, he said.
The destruction will also alter the local ecology, causing landslides, forest fires, forest pests and diseases, he said.
The storm caused trees to fall over, increasing the risk of forest fires, he said, especially as dry weather normally comes after a storm.
About 30,000 nationally protected wild animals were injured and froze to death during the storms, Zhu said.