Traditional beliefs, culture, and local biodiversity protection: An ethnographic study in the Shaluli Mountains Region, Sichuan Province, China

沙鲁里山系地区位于青藏高原东南部，横断山脉的腹心地区，也是中国“横断山南段生物多样性保护优先区域”的重要组成部分，该地区生态环境类型复杂多样、生物多样性丰富且独特。从古至今，沙鲁里山系地区的藏族多信奉藏传佛教，其教义中的基本理论”戒杀生“、“因果轮回”、“众生平等”和“万物有灵”深刻地影响当地信教藏族群众的生活方式、风俗习惯和行为规范。为了解这些信仰和习俗如何影响沙鲁里山系地区的生态环境和生物多样性，以及现代化对当地传统信仰和文化的影响，我们在七个沙鲁里山系所辖县域和邻近城市进行了为期三年的民族生物学实地调查。在这个相对偏远的地区，传统的世界观深刻地塑造了当地虔诚守信的藏族人的生活方式、习俗和行为规范。这些信仰影响了他们对自然世界的看法，总体对当地生态环境和生物多样性的长期保护具有积极作用。尽管沙鲁里山系周边地区的快速发展和现代化进程对这个生物多样性热点地区造成了一些威胁，但该地区的藏传佛教寺庙和僧侣在促进环境保护、森林资源管理和野生动物保护方面发挥着积极对作用。此外，我们发现，现代化压力和不断变化的社会经济条件对这些传统产生了一些负面影响，导致生物入侵和污染当地土壤和水源的可能性更大。 Located on the southeastern Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, the Shaluli Mountains Region (SMR) is an important conservation priority area in Southwest China’s highly biodiverse Hengduan Mountains. The SMR’s ecology is complex and topographically diverse, with unique composition of abundant flora and fauna. Historically and currently a majority-Tibetan region, Tibetan Buddhism has significantly affected most local people’s views on the natural environment. According to Tibetan religious theories and doctrines, the Shaluli Tibetans traditionally abstain from killing wild animals, believe in reincarnation (e.g., karmic cause and effect), the equality of all living beings, and the belief that everything has spirits. To understand how these beliefs and practices influenced the SMR’s ecology and biodiversity, and how modernization pressures affect them, we conducted a three-year ethnobiological field investigation in seven SMR counties and a neighboring city. The traditional worldview in this relatively remote region has profoundly shaped the lifestyles, customs, and behavioral norms of the local religiously-observant Tibetans. These beliefs have influenced their perspective on the natural world, having an overall positive role in the long-term protection of the local ecological environment and biodiversity. As the surrounding regions have experienced increasing development and modernization pressures that threaten this biodiversity hotspot, Shaluli’s Tibetan Buddhist temples and monks have assumed an active role promoting environmental protection, forest resource stewardship, and wildlife conservation. However, we found that modernization pressures and changing socio-economic conditions have negatively influenced these traditions, resulting in greater likelihood of biological invasions and pollution of the local soil and water sources.