Recently, 2023 International Conference on Protective Forests (ICPF 2023), co-hosted by Beijing Forestry University, jointly with the National Forestry and Grassland Administration Northwest North Northeast Shelterbelt Construction Bureau, Institute of Applied Ecology of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chinese Academy of Forestry and Liaoning Academy of Agricultural Sciences, was held in Shenyang, Liaoning Province. Vice President of BFU Zhang Zhiqiang delivered a speech at the opening ceremony of the conference and made a special invited report.

Zhang Zhiqiang extended a warm welcome to the participating leaders and experts at home and abroad on behalf of BFU, and expressed gratitude to the relevant institutions for their long-term support for BFU's talent training and scientific researches. He pointed out that China has made great contributions to the construction of forestry ecological projects and worldwide afforestation. Against the background of climate change and increased human disturbance, we still face problems and challenges in scientific afforestation of challenging sites and the improvement of the quality and efficiency of forest ecosystems. He hoped that needs of the construction and operation of the protective forests, in-depth discussion of new theories could be focus on in the conference, and new ideas, methods and technologies in the field could be discussed in depth to better play the functions of protective forests.

With the theme of "Integrated protection and systematic management of mountains, rivers, forests, fields, lakes, grasses and sand" in ecologically vulnerable area, the conference invited 17 well-known experts from home and abroad to give special reports. 54 keynote speeches and academic reports on scientific construction and sustainable management of protective forests and other 6 topics were presented.

Professor Zhang Zhiqiang and Professor Yu Xinxiao from the School of Soil and Water Conservation of BFU gave invited speeches entitled "Ecohydrological processes under climate change and the implications for protective forest" and "Construction and functional improvement of water conservation forests" respectively. Professor Xiao Huijie and Professor Jia Guodong also from the School of Soil and Water Conservation  and Professor Xi Benye from the College of Forestry gave keynote speeches in parallel sessions.

More than 300 experts, scholars and forestry scientific and technical personnel from China, the United States, Argentina, Sweden, Japan, Mongolia, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Pakistan and other countries and regions gathered together in the conference to promote global ecological protection and desertification control, and to contribute wisdom to the construction of major ecological projects in the whole world.