Schoolchildren in China’s Protected Areas from a Sustainability Perspective: A Preliminary Study

Protected areas (PAs) are an important estate for sustainable development. Children in PAs are of particular concern, as they are potential future stakeholders of this estate, yet they may be the ones affected the most by the conservation and development programs in PAs. However, knowledge on childr...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Sustainability 2023-07, Vol.15 (13), p.9896
Main Authors: Wang, Yicheng, Qin, Peng, Li, Shimei, Wu, Ruidong
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Children
Education
Elementary school students
Elementary schools
Nature conservation
Protected areas
Questionnaires
Rural areas
School attendance
Schools
Students
Surveys
Sustainability
Sustainable development
Urban areas
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Summary:Protected areas (PAs) are an important estate for sustainable development. Children in PAs are of particular concern, as they are potential future stakeholders of this estate, yet they may be the ones affected the most by the conservation and development programs in PAs. However, knowledge on children in PAs has been very limited, which threatens the probability of the success of both nature conservation and sustainable development. In this paper, we present the findings from a questionnaire survey targeted at schoolchildren in China’s PAs. Our sample consisted of 41 primary schools across China. We looked at 22 indexes of the sample, inferred the conditions in the whole PAs using an exact binomial test, and compared them with those in other rural or urban areas in China. We found that schoolchildren in PAs are substantially disadvantaged in terms of many indexes, both in school and at home. We discuss possible reasons, link these results to Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and discuss some policy implications. With this preliminary study, we hope to stimulate additional research on the conditions of children in PAs and their potential implications for sustainable development.
ISSN:2071-1050
2071-1050
DOI:10.3390/su15139896