Demographic change in Qilian Mountain Natural Reserve andits impact on forest steppe

The population change can make significant influence on ecological environment of Qilian Mountain Natural Reserve. From 1949 to 2009, it had turned out that the population of Tianzhu County and Sunan County had grown from 77 000 to over 253 000. The cultivated land areas of these two counties were just 23 000 ha at the beginning of 1950. It reached a maximum number of 43 800 ha in 1999 and remained a number of 41 000 ha in 2008. The grassland degradation reached 1 292 000 ha caused by overgrazing. The desertification areas had reached 496 000 ha and soil erosion areas had reached 883 300 ha. A recovery strategy was put forward in this paper, on degradation of forest and grassland including population policy, ecological immigrant project, reduction of population and animal husbandry production activities in Qilian Mountain Natural Reserve.