BEIJING, Dec. 6 (Xinhua) -- China will continue to enhance ecological environment in villages, bring the green coverage rate in rural areas to 30 percent and build 20,000 national forest villages by 2020, according to Liu Dongsheng, deputy director of the National Forestry and Grassland Administration on Wednesday.
Liu made the above remarks at a national village afforestation and beautification conference in Guilin city, south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.
According to incomplete statistics, during the 12th Five-year Plan period (2011-2015), the country completed greening of a total of 13.826 million hectares of rural areas and 1.637 million kilometers of roads.
At present, China's forest coverage rate has reached 21.66 percent.
Liu said that China will vigorously protect rural ecological resources, continuously strengthen public space and garden greening and beautification, and reinforce the construction of road water system and the system of shelter forests for farmlands. (Edited by Hu Pingchao, hupingchao@xinhua.org)