Jiuzhaigou Valley Scenic and Historic Interest Area

Low level of threat from forest pests and diseases has been reported but data and more detailed information is lacking (IUCN 1992; WHC/IUCN 1998; SP China 2003). The sporadic planting of exotic plants challenges the conservation concept of using native plants. The occurrence of forest pests and diseases in heritage sites has always been a major concern, which can not only harm forest health and ecosystem, but also affect the development of tourism (State Party of China, 2023).

Direct discharge of sewage from residences and hotels built within the park resulted in high levels of pollution in waterways prior to 2003. Initially installed sanitation and wastewater treatment systems were expensive, labour-intensive and ineffective due to engineering design flaws and management failures. Improved systems (which involve manually removing waste from the park) are replacing the former ones but some problems persist. A municipal waste treatment plant is being constructed close to Jiuzhaigou and in Nanping town, 40 km below Jiuzhaigou. There are still major concerns in how human waste is being collected within the site itself, from the 2000-40,000 visitors per day. Smaller amounts of waste are being produced by the 1300 local communities inside the park. As of 2012, the waste produced inside the park is being collected in a complicated system involving plastic bags, removed by truck and shredded. This practice is unsustainable and needs to be replaced with a more professional low tech, high-performance solution.(IUCN 1992; WHC/IUCN 1998; SP China 2003; Fang et al. 2005; Gaulke et al. 2009). Increased nitrogen and phosphorus concentrations that originate mainly from atmospheric pollution and tourist activities at scenic attractions have been demonstrated to trigger excessive diatom and algal growth which inhibits tufa precipitation (Du et al. 2018; Liu, 2017; Pan et al. 2017; Qiao et al., 2016, Wang et al. 2018). Limiting numbers of tourists may be necessary to avoid the degradation of tufa. It is also likely that at least some air pollution comes form the Sichuan basin (IUCN Consultation, 2020), making air pollution a local and regional threat.

Local residents are Amdo Tibetan, previously living in nine villages but now reduced to four through resettlement and/or relocated to other villages. Land in subsistence agriculture has been converted to forest starting in 2001 (Du et al. 2018). Archaeological research demonstrates at a site inside the park, however, that humans have inhabited this landscape for at least the past 4000 years (Henck et al. 2010, Trac et al. 2013, d’Alpoim Guedes et al. 2015, Lu et al. 2010; Harrell et al. 2016). Several authors have contended that these landscape features are both culturally and ecological relevant as they support culturally and ecologically important plant, bird, and animal species (Winkler 1997, Urgenson et al. 2014, Harrell et al. 2016). For example in Zharu valley, the current landscape is losing its patchiness and therefore much of its biodiversity. The Indigenous people in the reserve lament the loss of aesthetics and memory as well as the culturally important plants and animals (Harrell et al. 2016). Loss of cultural traditions and practices has occurred through the establishment of a tourist-service culture. The population is composed of about 1,300 villagers today, serving mainly as tourist merchandise sellers, guides, craftsmen and entertainers. the local community suffers from some inequality in the distribution of economic benefits (IUCN 1992; WHC/IUCN 1998; SP China 2003; Hendricksen 2009; Yang 2011; IUCN Consultation 2017). The 2017 earthquake demonstrated the fragility of the current model of making local inhabitants entirely reliant on tourism. The park was closed for two years after the earthquake resulting in joblessness for over 18,000 residents when accounting for the wider area also (Du et al. 2018). Their relocation is also making them more vulnerable to the effects of earthquakes and landslides (Chen et al. 2018).

There has been a dramatic increase in the annual number of tourist visitors from 170,000 in 1991 (just prior to inscription of the property) to 5 million in 2015 and also reported by the State Party in 2023 (State Party of China, 2023), with growth accelerating from 1998.
With the launch of a new railway section in southwest China, bullet trains began service in 2024, offering direct access to the World Heritage site.
The bullet train service reduces travel time from Chengdu, the capital of southwest China's Sichuan Province, to the station near the UNESCO site to just 1 hour and 39 minutes (Xinhua, 2024). This development will likely further increase tourism pressure on the property.

Expansion of hotels occurred inside the park until 2001 when all were closed and removed outside. More than 100 hotels plus other guest houses were clustered around the property entrances and are visually intrusive. Many of these have been rebuilt and torn down following the earthquake and a new more visually appealing tourist center is being built. However, rapid expansion of new hotels is taking place in neighbouring towns with potential impacts on biodiversity (Liu et al. 2018). The park was closed following the earthquake between 2017 and has reopened in a controlled fashion in 2019 to limited numbers of tourists, however shut its doors again during the Covid-19 crisis. Some 80% of tourists come in the festival and holiday periods of Spring Festival, which occurs at some point between January and March, summer holidays June-September, and Golden Week in October, causing overcrowding at times. Visitor numbers were capped at 41,000 per day from 2013 (increased from 12,000 from 2001). On many days the numbers of visitors entering the site exceeded 20,000 persons. These high numbers of tourism also place high demands on the limited park staff, who lack sufficient human capacity to carry out other important research and operations when high numbers of tourists are present. Domestic wastewater, automobile exhaust and domestic garbage generated by tourists have a negative impact on the environment (State Party of China, 2023). In this regard, the government has taken measures to reduce the negative impact.

Private vehicles were banned and replaced in 1999 by low-polluting buses with guides. The low-polluting buses do require regular maintenance however. Damage to trails and pollution of waterways were reduced by construction of boardwalks and introduction of improved waste management systems, respectively. On-going tourism development remains the greatest management challenge for the property (UNEP/WCMC, 2011; WHC/IUCN, 1998; SP China, 2003; Li, 2005(a),2005(b); Hendricksen, 2009; Gu et al., 2013). The increased numbers of tourists are damaging the waterways through changes in water chemistry, which is impacting tufa growth, despite the presence of boardwalks, and emissions from cars might be responsible for a major part of this (Du et al. 2018). The park needs to reduce the number of tourists to preserve the landscape. However this is difficult as Du et al. 2018 note that funds raised from the admission fees in 2015 alone accounted for 26% of the fiscal revenue of Aba Prefecture and the tourist industry accounts for 60% of the gross domestic product (GDP) of Jiuzhaigou County and the service industry composes 33% over the past 5 years (Du et al. 2018). Some balance that includes greater autonomy allowing return to traditional livelihoods will be necessary to balance the economic impact of reducing tourism in the area.

Rapidly warming temperatures on the Tibetan plateau have been associated with catastrophically heavy rainfall which may result in increased erosion (Li et al 2025), mudflows and flash flooding in the region as a result of climate change. The effects of this are expected to increase with global warming. Atmospheric warming will impact higher altitudes in particular through reduction in snow and ice cover and there will likely be an altitudinal shift of vegetation zones affecting ecosystems and wildlife habitats (Bossard et al., 2015). Rainstorms may cause landslides, falling trees, rocks, etc., threatening human safety and silting of lakes. There were 55 heavy rains and 19 heavy rains in 6 years. The floods may submerge the sightseeing walkway, induce lake dam break, and threaten the heritage and human safety. In August 2020, the park was temporarily closed due to continuous heavy rainfall (State Party of China, 2023).

In addition, the local community is suffering from loss of traditional ecological knowledge as well as their own dialect of Tibetan which is undervalued by local initiatives in which there is huge pressure for young people to join the tourist industry and neglect traditional language and ecological knowledge. There are currently less than 1000 speakers of Jiuzhaigou Tibetan and preservation of this language (in which key ecological and religious values are embedded) is sorely needed (Gong 2016, Suzuki 2013). Key ecological knowledge and religious values are encoded in language and cultural practices (Karmay and Sagant 1999)

The 7.0 earthquake on August 8, 2017 in Jiuzhaigou caused significant effects on all WH values in this property. Luo et al. (2023) demonstrates that the overall landscape grade of Jiuzhaigou decreased by 15% after the earthquake; the aesthetic indicator of the landscape within geological hazard experienced the greatest decline, decreasing by 73.3%, while the landscape's resilience indicator showed relatively minor changes. The study also underscores the concentrated presence of geological hazard points and high visual sensitivity between the Nuorilang Waterfall and the scenic area entrance, necessitating prioritized restoration efforts in this zone. Furthermore, the ecological recovery will take a considerable amount of time to return to the pre-earthquake state (Duan et al. 2024).

As of 2019, large parts of the roads in the park as well as key sites of natural beauty have been painstakingly restored through great effort of the park personnel, with the exception of the higher altitude area of the park where damage to roads and landslides were too extensive to be removed. Improved walkways as well as toilets and rest sites have been rebuilt and most sites of natural beauty appear to have recovered from the event (IUCN Consultation 2020). Post-earthquake landslides and debris flows continue, however, to impact the park and its surrounding areas. These events are often precipitated by extreme or high rainfall events which have been increasing in frequency over recent decades due to the effects of climate change (Li et al. 2018; Lei et al. 2018; Wang et al. 2018; Sun et al. 2018; Yue et al. 2018). Of particular concern, for human impacts are the low altitude areas in which the local Tibetan communities who inhabit the park have been resettled to. These communities used to inhabit higher altitude areas of the park in a dispersed settlement pattern, however, their settlements have been relocated to lower altitude areas immediately along the tourist route which are vulnerable to debris flow and landslides (Chen et al. 2018). Both Heye and Zharu villages remain at risk because of their positions close to debris flow fans with Heye located downhill of a giant slow moving earthflow/slump feature. Increased rainfall may increase these hazards even independent of earthquakes (IUCN Consultation, 2020), as evidenced by the rapid failure of the road built to Panya village at the very top of that valley. The relocation of residents to new locations may be increasing their vulnerability to geological hazards. Debris flow dams were set up at Heye village prior to the earthquake and some hazard mitigation structures were set up at Zharu, however, both can be made vulnerable again by heavy rainstorms. Risks are also high to scenic areas near both locations (Chen et al. 2018).