After more than two decades of pursuing an ecology-first strategy, Shanghai's Chongming district has achieved a balance between environmental protection and economic growth.

Chongming has made progresses in building into a "world-class eco-island", according to information released by the Shanghai Bureau of Ecology and Environment at an event held on the sidelines of the 2026 Shanghai Chongming Eco-Island International Forum on Saturday.

Since 2001, when the "eco-island" vision was initiated, more than 600 high-energy-consumption and high-pollution enterprises in Chongming have been shut down or restructured.

Thanks to vigorous afforestation efforts, forest coverage in the district has increased from no more than 10 percent at the turn of the millennium to 30.7 percent today.

As a key stopover on the East Asian-Australasian Flyway, Chongming has also made significant progress in bird conservation.

The number of migratory birds stopping over at the Shanghai Chongming Dongtan National Nature Reserve has increased from under 40,000 in 2009 to nearly 500,000 last year.

When the reserve was established in 1998, a little over 10 tundra swans wintered there.

Last year, that number had risen to nearly 5,000.

Addressing the event, Hu Jun, director of the Policy Research Center for Environment and Economy of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, stressed that the progress has been achieved following President Xi Jinping's instruction to steadfastly build Chongming into an eco-island.

In April 2007, only two weeks into his tenure as Shanghai's Party chief, Xi devoted a full day to a field inspection of the Chongming Eco-Island construction, then still in its infancy, Hu recalled.

"He emphasized the importance of steadfastly forging ahead with the vision of building an eco-island, urging that once the direction is set, there should be no wavering," Hu said.

"Now standing at a new historical starting point, we must strive to bring biodiversity protection to a new level under the guidance of Xi Jinping Thought on Ecological Civilization," he added.

Tang Chendong, deputy head of the Shanghai Bureau of Ecology and Environment, said that without harming ecology or biodiversity, Chongming has preliminarily established a green energy system based on wind and solar power, and has vigorously promoted circular agriculture.

According to a report jointly released by the Chongming government and the Policy Research Center for Environment and Economy, renewable sources supplied 38 percent of Chongming's total electricity consumption in 2025.

Chongming's energy intensity — energy consumption per unit of GDP — last year declined by 13.5 percent from 2020 levels.

Tang added that Chongming has registered rapid growth in green and eco-friendly industries such as ecotourism, sports and wellness care.

"Compared with the early 2000s, Chongming's economic value added has increased more than fivefold and its per capita GDP nearly sevenfold, marking initial success in converting ecological strengths into development gains and greater wellbeing for the people," he said.

Kaveh Zahedi, director of the Office of Climate Change, Biodiversity and Environment at the Food and Agriculture Organization, said,"The development of Dongtan, a city of the future in Shanghai's Chongming district, is an example of how sustainable agriculture and green development work together in an urban context."