Wild camels, or wild double-hump camels, only live in three regions -- the middle of the Taklimakan Desert in Xinjiang, an area bordering China and Mongolia and the Lop Nur region -- according to Yuan Guoying, an expert at the Xinjiang Research Institute for Environmental Protection.

He said the number of wild camels in the world was believed to be between 790 and 890. An estimated 400 to 480 of them live in the Lop Nur region. It is commonly considered to be a critically endangered species.

In 1998, the Global Environment Facility (GEF), which aims to fund projects and programs addressing key global environment threats, approved a plan to build a nature reserve in the Lop Nur region.

The project, which was completed in September, involved a total investment of US$1.42 million, of which US$725,000 was donated by the GEF. The reserve covers 78,000 square kilometers.

The investment also included 1.5 million yuan (US$181,000) from the region's government, according to Zhang Yongshan, director of the reserve's management center.

During the next five years, more work will be done to publicize among residents living around the reserve the importance of ecosystem protection, said Zhang Yu, vice-director of the management center, at a recent two-day meeting in Beijing, held to officially conclude the reserve's start-up phase.

He said the center will plant grass and drill wells in the reserve to improve the camels' habitat and set up an aid center to help injured or sick ones.

Efforts will also be made to clearly determine the exact number of camels in the reserve and how they move throughout the region, he said.

John Hare, founder of the UK-based Wild Camel Protection Foundation, which helped raise international funds for the establishment of the reserve, said at the meeting there needed to be more check-points and more staff in the reserve because of the large areas it covered.

Currently, there are five check-points and around 40 staff.

Also, the number of animals the reserve can support needs to be investigated, Hare suggested.

The foundation will continue to help seek foreign funding for the reserve, he said.

"We should not be complacent (of the achievements made)," he said, adding that the establishment of the reserve is just the beginning of the process to protect the wild camel population.

(China Daily January 14, 2003)