The sea breeze blows gently and the mangroves sway. Strolling along the Xisha Huan coastline of Xiwang in Fangchenggang City, Guangxi, and on Shanxin Sand Island, lush mangroves stretch out into the sea beside you. This area, once "dirty, chaotic, and poor," has now taken on a completely new look.

From February 26 to 27, the 2024 Guangxi Environmental Protection Century Tour entered Fangchenggang City, Guangxi. A media interview group followed a special research team of the Standing Committee of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region People's Congress to conduct on-site visits to the city's marine ecological protection and restoration achievements.

Fangchenggang City has a coastline of more than 530 kilometers, and coastal zone resources are the foundation and essence of the city. Before ecological remediation, the Xisha Huan coastline at Xiwang was severely affected by waves, storm surges, and surrounding urban construction, resulting in serious coastal erosion and a loss of ecological functions, which severely affected the ecological landscape of the Xiwang sea area.

Beginning in 2012, Fangchenggang City implemented restoration and construction projects on the Hongshahuan ecological seawall, including ecological revetment, rock-lined embankment, toe-of-dike fish reefs, wooden boardwalks, artificial lagoon wetlands, semi-mangrove community restoration, and salt marsh grass restoration, gradually building an ecological seawall that integrates coastal protection, biodiversity and ecological restoration, landscape optimization, and leisure and science education.

Tang Shangping, deputy director of the Guangxi Fangchenggang Municipal Ocean Bureau, said in an interview with reporters that the Xiwang Hongshahuan ecological seawall project was successfully selected in September 2023 as one of eight international cases of global coastal zone ecological disaster reduction synergy jointly selected by the Ministry of Natural Resources and the International Union for Conservation of Nature, and was promoted to the world.

On Shanxin Sand Island, located in Shanxin Village, Qisha Town, the sky is blue and the water is clear, and lush casuarina trees rustle in the sea breeze. Because it has high-quality and richly diverse coastal wetland habitats such as mangroves, muddy tidal flats, and beaches, Shanxin Sand Island has become one of the most important waterbird habitats along the Guangxi coast, and also an important stopover and wintering site on the East Asian-Australasian Flyway.

According to reports, after the completion of the Shanxin Sand Island ecological island and reef project, the island area expanded from 4.1 hectares in 2017 to 9.2 hectares. The ecological sand-blocking dike plays a role in wave protection and sand stabilization, and newly planted coastal plants such as mangroves, Scaevola taccada, and beach morning glory have also grown to scale, continuously improving the surrounding ecological environment and enhancing the island's biodiversity.

To consolidate the construction achievements, representatives of the people's congress liaison station in Shanxin Village and village committee cadres conduct inspections from time to time, carry out remediation of the environment around Shanxin Sand Island, and clean up marine litter.

"In recent years, Shanxin Sand Island has attracted more migratory birds to spend the winter here. Among them, the spoon-billed sandpiper, a rare bird species in the world, has also appeared frequently, fully reflecting the continuous improvement of the island's ecological environment," said Chen Bo, deputy head of the people's congress liaison station in Shanxin Village, Qisha Town.