Northwest China's Shaanxi Province will expand forest coverage in the next five years to ward off air pollution, the provincial forestry bureau said over the weekend.
Shaanxi will add 13 million mu (around 866,667 hectares) of new forests and build three urban forest clusters to improve the region's natural environment.
These newly added greens will expand the province's forest coverage to 20 million mu (around 1.33 million hectares), or 45 percent of the total land, in the next five years, the forestry bureau said, adding they also hope to expand wetlands to 4.6 million mu (306,667 hectares).
A ten-year plan launched in 2015 aims to have healthy forests account for 70 percent of all forests in the province, compared with 45.6 percent currently.
