More than 310,000 votes were cast on the Internet prior to March 22, 2009. After consultation with experts, 31 provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions of China's mainland, Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan all have had their own representative plant and animal species selected.

China is a vast country and its natural ecosystem differs significantly from region to region, resulting in a rich and complicated tapestry of biodiversity. Since most provincial borders are formed by mountains, rivers and other natural features, every province is endowed with a unique natural environment; they all have their own animal and plant species, along with cultures and customs that go along with them.

"Since every province has rich biodiversity, it's not easy to select a single representative of all species," said Xie Yan, chief of the Wildlife Conservation Society, one of the sponsors of the selection. He said the "biological card" should cover as many different species as possible, and both the common species as well as the rare ones should be listed. "Most people don't know many species, especially plants. We have created a blog for each of the candidates for people to understand them."

In the organizer's opinion, the selection process for regional representatives is very important—as voters ponder which they want to select, they deepen their knowledge of the range of species as well. The "biological card" for each region is intended to become the area's image and brand and also boost public participation in protecting wildlife.

"The beauty and value of the biological world along with its worsening condition have contributed to arousing people's awareness to restrict their destructive behaviors, so as to protect biodiversity," said Xie.

Boosting awareness

China is one of the countries that are home to a high level of biodiversity and is also one where it has been gravely threatened.

"Like many other countries and regions, economic activities have a large impact on both animals and plants, the latter of which is facing larger difficulties in finding protection than the former," said Xie, explaining that animals can move away from danger while plants cannot.

She said that the Liaoning Province's plant representative, Siebold's Magnolia, is suffering from unrestrained exploitation due to its economic and ornamental value. "The plunderers dig the plants bag by bag, selling the valuables and dumping the rest. That's a crushing blow to the protection of the plant," she said.

According to her, humans have classified species as those that are valuable and those that are expendable according to their needs of life and production. Some species have been pushed to the verge of extinction because of over-exploitation. Forests are cut down to make room for "valuable" plants, endangering the survival of thousands of native species. Alien species have been introduced that change the natural biology of an area.