South China Karst
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How it came to be
The South China Karst is a World Heritage property of seven clusters across Yunnan, Guizhou, Guangxi and Chongqing. The karst of southern China covers about 550,000 km², falling some 2,000 m over 700 km from the Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau in the west, averaging 2,100 m, to the Guangxi Basin in the east, averaging 110 m. It is regarded as the world's reference area for karst in the humid tropics and subtropics.
The first three clusters, Shilin in Yunnan, Libo in Guizhou and Wulong in Chongqing, were inscribed in 2007. Shilin is a forest of limestone pillars carved by wind and water from rock laid down in a shallow sea some 270 million years ago, and it is the world reference for pinnacle karst. Libo is known for cone karst, and Wulong for giant dolines, or tiankeng, and natural bridges.
In 2014 four more clusters were added: Guilin, Shibing, Jinfoshan and Huanjiang. Shilin is also the land of the Yi people, who tell of Ashima, a girl forbidden to marry the man she loved, who turned into a stone in the forest. Each year on the 24th day of the sixth lunar month the Yi hold the Torch Festival. The site's management recognises the traditional land care of the Yi, Shui, Yao and Buyi peoples and of the bamboo harvesters of Jinfoshan.
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