The State Council has approved a national territorial spatial plan for Shaanxi province for the 2021-2035 period, according to an official reply released on Feb 4.

According to the reply, by 2035, the total area of cultivated land in Shaanxi should be no less than 43.26 million mu, of which the protection area for permanent basic farmland will be no less than 33.78 million mu, and the red line area for ecological protection should not be less than 48,600 square kilometers.

The document emphasized the need to strengthen the coordinated development of city groups in Guanzhong Plain with those in the Chengdu-Chongqing Economic Circle, as well as those in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River, Central Plains, central Shanxi province and Lanzhou-Xining, in an effort to accelerate the formation of an important opening-up channel for Central Asian, South Asian, and West Asian countries.

Measures will be taken to expand production spaces for agricultural products with special characteristics, intensify ecological barriers along Qinling and Daba Mountains, and the Loess Plateau in northern Shaanxi all the way to the Great Wall, and strengthen ecological protection and restoration in the Yellow River Basin, the reply said.

It will also improve the spatial protection mechanism of cultural and natural heritages, according to the reply.