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Sandstorm research launched
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Zhang Zhiyong
SPECIALISTS with the State Environmental Protection Administration and the Chinese Academy of Sciences recently kicked off a research investigation into the sources of sandstorms, the first scientific investigation of the phenomena ever undertaken in China.
Wang Tao, deputy director of the Cold and Arid Areas and Environmental Research Institute and head of the second research team, said: "The northern areas of our country are frequently struck by sandstorms in the spring. It is the first time in China that we have conducted such a research journey into sandstorm source regions."
He also noted: "We expect to obtain first-hand materials and understand sandstorms through investigation so as to eventually be able to forecast storms".
Researchers and experts specializing in desertification, biology, botany and climatology have been divided into two teams to investigate along the routes of sandstorms.
The first team, headed by Han Xingguo, the director of the Botany Research Institute attached to the Chinese Academy of Sciences, will set out from Beijing to venture through the northern part of Hebei Province. Their destination will be a desert in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.
The second team, led by Wang Tao, started the journey in Lanzhou, capital city of Gansu Province, and will confine their research to the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.
Reporters from CCTV will also join the two research teams to keep a record of the investigation.
The latest statistics released by the China Meteorological Centre show that most regions in northern China witnessed an increase in the frequency of sandstorms between 1999 and 2000, surpassing the average figure recorded in the 1990s
To step up the fight against sandstorms, a nationwide sandstorm monitoring and forecast system was put into trial operation on March 1 this year.
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