Although China has experienced economic progress since 1978, environmental degradation has caused many problems due to population increases and demand for natural resources. These pressures have led to the use of inappropriate cultivation methods in agriculture, forestry, and livestock raising, and increasing amounts of vegetation and forests are still being destroyed (1). Environmental degradation will be one of the great threats to global environmental health in the future. The Yellow River Delta (between 117 deg 48' and 119 deg 45'E and 36 deg 52' and 38 deg 12'N), one of the largest deltas in China, is situated in the northeast of Shandong Province on the southern bank of the Bohai Sea. It includes the cities of Dongying and Binzhou and parts of the cities of Zibo, Dezhou, and Weifang (Fig. 1). The delta covers an area of 7870 km~2 and is home to a population of 5.4 million (1).
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