Though Canada’s relations with China at the moment are not the best due to Huawei’s chief financial officer Meng Wanzhou’s arrest on US fraud charges in Vancouver last December, the Chinese still look up to Canadians for one thing — outdoor sports. Banff Mountain Film Festival China Tour has been inspiring a large number of people in China for almost a decade.
When Tina Qian Haiying, an outdoor sports enthusiast, attended the Banff Mountain Film Festival in Canada in 2009, she thought China needed such films to popularise outdoor sports. Next year she introduced the festival to China as Banff Mountain Film Festival China Tour. China is now among the 50 countries with a local chapter of the Banff festival. Banff China oragnises film exhibitions in several cities, including stand-alone exhibitions on various adventure sports. It also hosts seminars, lectures and training programs. Qian had quit her job of a marketing executive in IBM to devot herself to Banff China.
“When I was fresh in outdoor sports, China had not taken up that craze, and I often learned about outdoor sport ideas and skills from foreign countries,” Qian told China Daily last year. An annual presentation of short films and documentaries about mountain culture, sports and environment, Banff China has become a popular gathering of outdoors enthusiasts, including sports fans, adventurers, photographers, filmmakers and environmentalists, according to the Daily.
Banff China has also produced several its own films one of which, ‘Searching for Christmas Tree’, was nominated for the Banff Mountain Film Competition. The documentary film shows Chinese ice-climbing team’s discovery of a frozen waterfall shaped like a Christmas tree.
When Qian established Banff China a decade ago, outdoor sports such as skydiving, slacklining and white-water kayaking were minority pursuits in China. “Once we showed a film on longboarding. People only knew about skateboarding then. After the film screened, one of our sports equipment sponsors thanked me for boosting their sales of longboards. After we screened films on slacklining and invited slacklining masters to perform in our carnivals, the sport’s popularity in China grew,” she told SCMP.
Traditinally, adventure sports had little attraction in China. But with growing prosperity and global exposure, the Chinese are taking up adventure sports. “In places like the US, Europe, Australia and New Zealand which have had strong economies for a long time, children do things like biking with their parents in the wild when they are young and start climbing mountains when they are older. That’s how they spend their weekends,” Qian told SCMP.
“In China, outdoor areas represent hardships which should be avoided. It’s only after the Chinese started getting more affluent over the past two decades that they started talking about going back to nature to challenge themselves. Doing outdoor sports is not only about nurturing a healthy lifestyle, it is also a luxurious spiritual pursuit.”
Banff China has carved out a target audience for itself as interest in outdoor sports grows. Now it remains active round the year. Apart from Banff Mountain Film Festival China Tour, it also hosts Ocean Film Festival, China Snow Film Festival and China Outdoor Film Festival.
What were you thinking??? Mountain biking and trail-building destroy wildlife habitat! Mountain biking is environmentally, socially, and medically destructive!
Bicycles should not be allowed in any natural area. They are inanimate objects and have no rights. There is also no right to mountain bike. That was settled in federal court in 1996: https://mjvande.info/mtb10.htm . It’s dishonest of mountain bikers to say that they don’t have access to trails closed to bikes. They have EXACTLY the same access as everyone else — ON FOOT! Why isn’t that good enough for mountain bikers? They are all capable of walking….
A favorite myth of mountain bikers is that mountain biking is no more harmful to wildlife, people, and the environment than hiking, and that science supports that view. Of course, it’s not true. To settle the matter once and for all, I read all of the research they cited, and wrote a review of the research on mountain biking impacts (see https://mjvande.info/scb7.htm ). I found that of the seven studies they cited, (1) all were written by mountain bikers, and (2) in every case, the authors misinterpreted their own data, in order to come to the conclusion that they favored. They also studiously avoided mentioning another scientific study (Wisdom et al) which did not favor mountain biking, and came to the opposite conclusions.
Mountain bikers also love to build new trails – legally or illegally. Of course, trail-building destroys wildlife habitat – not just in the trail bed, but in a wide swath to both sides of the trail! E.g. grizzlies can hear a human from one mile away, and smell us from 5 miles away. Thus, a 10-mile trail represents 100 square miles of destroyed or degraded habitat, that animals are inhibited from using. Mountain biking, trail building, and trail maintenance all increase the number of people in the park, thereby preventing the animals’ full use of their habitat. See https://mjvande.info/scb9.htm for details.
Mountain biking accelerates erosion, creates V-shaped ruts, kills small animals and plants on and next to the trail, drives wildlife and other trail users out of the area, and, worst of all, teaches kids that the rough treatment of nature is okay (it’s NOT!). What’s good about THAT?
To see exactly what harm mountain biking does to the land, watch this 5-minute video:
In addition to all of this, it is extremely dangerous: https://mjvande.info/mtb_dangerous.htm .
For more information: https://mjvande.info/mtbfaq.htm .
The common thread among those who want more recreation in our parks is total ignorance about and disinterest in the wildlife whose homes these parks are. Yes, if humans are the only beings that matter, it is simply a conflict among humans (but even then, allowing bikes on trails harms the MAJORITY of park users — hikers and equestrians — who can no longer safely and peacefully enjoy their parks).
The parks aren’t gymnasiums or racetracks or even human playgrounds. They are WILDLIFE HABITAT, which is precisely why they are attractive to humans. Activities such as mountain biking, that destroy habitat, violate the charter of the parks.
Even kayaking and rafting, which give humans access to the entirety of a water body, prevent the wildlife that live there from making full use of their habitat, and should not be allowed. Of course those who think that only humans matter won’t understand what I am talking about — an indication of the sad state of our culture and educational system.