Daqing Mountain located in Baotou, Inner Mongolia [Photo/Baotou Daily] 

Progress has been made in efforts to restore the natural but depleted beauty of Daqing Mountain -- located in the area administered by Baotou city in North China's Inner Mongolia autonomous region -- and get it greener, according to local officials.

Daqing Mountain, the Big Green Mountain, was once forest-rich but due to excessive logging it became bare. Programs began to plant trees and grass there in an attempt to restore its original appearance.  

Officials said that over the past five years, 52,000 mu or 3,467 hectares of vegetation had been added on the southern slopes of Daqing Mountain.

The original greening achievements have been maintained and upgraded with high standards, through such measures such as diverting water from the Yellow River to mountains and the development of water-saving irrigation facilities.

This year, under the pressure given by the COVID-19 pandemic, Baotou city implemented an environmental restoration and greening project on the southern slopes of Daqing Mountain, covering 9,800 mu.

Watering, weeding, pruning and cleaning up of dead trees was carried out, with replanting of key green areas such as the southern slopes, areas along the roads and villages.

Officials said that as of June 30, the city's forest and grass protection and restoration had obtained national and autonomous region-level special funds of 372 million yuan ($53 million).

They said the program had implemented various protection and restoration projects covering 870,000 mu, accounting for 79 percent of the annual target of 1.1 million mu.

At present, the forest area administered by the city now covers 7.46 million mu, the wetlands occupy more than 1.4 million mu, while grassland area now covers 30.19 million mu.

Officials said the desertified regions continue to decrease.

They said important environmental protection bulwarks such as forests, grassland sand wetlands have improved significantly in the region.