Officials in Shangri-La vowed to make consistent efforts to protect the environment, as the Chinese filmmaker Chen Kaige's shooting of its epic "The Promise" damaged local natural ecology and drawing wide criticism.

Shangri-La sits in the junction of Yunnan, Sichuan provinces and the Tibet Autonomous Region. It is famous for the breath-taking natural sceneries described in James Hilton's 1933 novel "Lost Horizon."

"We used to seek short-term economic gains at the cost of environment, and now we are fully aware that making friends with it is essential to any development," said Chen Jianguo, deputy magistrate of the Tibet Autonomous Prefecture of Diqing, Yunnan, where Shangri-La County is located.

"Shangri-La has many river sources of China, some of which even flow into the neighboring countries, so the protection of the place renders international significance," Chen added.

A few days ago, Qiu Baoxing, China's vice minister for construction, accused Chen Kaige's epic film "The Promise" of damaging the Bigu pond in Shangri-La while shooting the film, saying its crew littered the area with garbage and destroyed a large area planted with azalea flower.

"The Promise," a 35 million U.S. dollars' film that won a Golden Globe nomination for best foreign film, is known for its stunning visuals and an international cast.

Diqing Prefecture was notorious in the 1980s because of felling down virgin forest in hopes of developing local economy, and warned by the central government. Then it set up several national natural reserves.

At present, 65.5 percent of the prefecture has been covered with forest, and dubbed as one of the richest bio-diversity areas in Eurasia. It has more than five thousand higher plants and 64 kinds of precious animals listed in China's wildlife protection law.

(Xinhua News Agency May 23, 2006)