Local court officials plant mangroves in the city's Gangkou district on March 7. [Photo for China Daily]
In July 2024, the Ningming court applied labor substitution for the first time. The case dated back to June 2022, when an individual surnamed Ning sold 14 endangered turtles that he had purchased illegally from a scenic area via WeChat. He was caught the following month.
The court found him guilty of illegally purchasing and selling nationally protected rare and endangered wild animals, sentencing him to six months in prison, a 5,000 yuan ($685) fine, and payment of 45,000 yuan in ecological compensation.
Given his financial circumstances, the court allowed him to serve 173 days of community service, which included patrolling the Huashan conservation area and joining environmental education efforts, instead of paying ecological compensation.
"Turning the criminal from an 'ecological destroyer' into a 'guardian of Huashan' not only serves the principle of 'who damages, pays' in environmental public interest litigation but also replaces a simple punitive approach," Huang said.
She added that community service helps offenders like Ning enhance their legal and environmental awareness through river cleanups, mountain patrols, and wildlife protection activities. "It serves both punitive and educational purposes," she said.
Guangxi is charting a new path in environmental judicial protection, with in situ restoration of a site as the principle and offsite alternative restoration as a supplement. This approach integrates restorative justice into broader social governance.
By 2025, the region's courts had established 15 environmental judicial protection and restoration bases, creating dedicated spaces for rehabilitation and public education.
"In the past, we focused more on imposing damages payments. Now we have more options — labor substitution, technology upgrades in lieu of penalties, and carbon credit purchases," Deng, from Fangchenggang court, said.
"These diversified alternative restoration methods are exactly what the forthcoming Ecological and Environmental Code encourages."
