Five Chinese individuals and organizations won China's first Wildlife Conservation Awards on Thursday in Beijing.
The event was jointly created by WildAid and the China Environmental Protection Foundation. It's aimed to recognize individuals and organizations who have made outstanding contributions to wildlife conservation in China.

Yang Xin, one of the individual winners, has worked on environmental protection on the upstream area of the Yangtze River for the past 18 years.

"If the ecological problems in this area aren't handled properly, it is possible that in the near future the glacier will disappear completely and the Yangtze River trickle through the middle of a desert."

Steve Trent is the president of WildAid:

"If you continue to take away the natural species that make up our environment and give it its security and strength, then ultimately you will see great damage being done and this damage will impact people living here in this country."

The other four winners hailed from all over the country.

A National Natural Reserve Area in Hubei was awarded for re-introducing David's Deer into China.

The Urumqi Anti-smuggling Department in Xinjiang took an award for uncovering cases of smuggling endangered species.

The other winners were nature reserve in Hainan which reproduces endangered species and a farmer from Yunnan province who has been standing up for the protection of Chinese Yew trees in his village.

The prize money presented to the five winners will go towards thier wildlife conservation projects.