Volvo Environment Prize 2026 goes to Bojie Fu for greening China's Loess Plateau
Professor Bojie Fu has won the 2026 Volvo Environment Prize for decades of research that helped turn China's ecologically collapsed Loess Plateau green again.
- SEK 1.5 million
- 1990
- November 2, 2026, Stockholm
- September 23, 2026
What Happened
The Loess Plateau was a major cradle of early Chinese civilization, but centuries of intensive cultivation and overgrazing pushed this huge area towards ecological collapse. Vegetation disappeared, soil was swept away, and vast quantities of sediment poured into the Yellow River, making the landscape a stark symbol of unsustainable land use. Today, large areas of the plateau are green again. Behind that revival lies one of the world's most ambitious landscape-restoration efforts, and decades of scientific research into how damaged ecosystems can be rebuilt without exhausting the scarce resources on which both nature and people depend.
Professor Bojie Fu is a Professor of Geography and Landscape Ecology at the Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and he has played a decisive role in that work. Through extensive field studies and landscape-scale analysis, he and his team investigated the complex relationships between land use, vegetation, water, soil, biodiversity and local livelihoods. Their research revealed both the potential and the risks of ecological restoration: more vegetation can hold soil in place, capture carbon and revive biodiversity, but planting the wrong species, or planting too densely, can deepen water scarcity and threaten the long-term survival of the restored landscape. That evidence helped shift restoration strategies away from mass planting campaigns towards carefully adapted, sustainable land management, offering practical guidance on which species to plant, where they could thrive, and how to balance restoration with agriculture and local communities' needs.
- Scientific guidance on which species to plant and where they could thrive
- Balancing restoration with agriculture and local communities' needs
- The project dubbed Grain for Green, which compensated local communities and farmers who feared for their livelihoods
- World Bank funding for early demonstration projects, with most subsequent investment coming from the Chinese government
- Sustained financial and political commitment, continuous scientific monitoring and a willingness to adapt when established approaches were not working
- Local communities, government agencies, researchers and international partners
“The Prize Jury recognizes Professor Fu's pioneering contributions to social-ecological systems and sustainability science, as well as his exceptional ability to connect local restoration with global sustainable development. The Jury particularly highlights how his work on the Loess Plateau has created science-based pathways for ecological recovery, human well-being, and effective policy across the Global South.”
The Volvo Environment Prize has been awarded annually since 1990 and is regarded as one of the scientific world's most respected environmental prizes. It is presented by an independent foundation, and the award consists of a hand-crafted diploma, a glass sculpture and SEK 1.5 million. Professor Bojie Fu will receive the prize at a ceremony in Stockholm on November 2, 2026. His research demonstrates how science can turn restoration ambitions into lasting environmental change, and how a landscape once considered devastated can be given a future.
The Volvo Environment Prize is awarded for the first time; it has been presented annually ever since.
Professor Bojie Fu is announced as the 2026 laureate of the Volvo Environment Prize.
Fu receives the prize at a ceremony in Stockholm.
Why this matters
The Volvo Environment Prize is Volvo Group's own annual environmental award, and this year it recognises research that changed how a vast, badly eroded region of China is managed. The work matters to the farmers and local communities whose livelihoods depend on the plateau, and the prize jury says its lessons offer science-based pathways for recovery and policy across the Global South.
Terms in This Story
- Loess Plateau
- A large plateau region in China that the source describes as a major cradle of early Chinese civilization and as the site of a long-running restoration effort.
- Grain for Green
- A project named in the source that helped overcome local resistance to changing land use by compensating communities and farmers.
- Global South
- A term for developing countries, used in the source to describe where the research's policy lessons can be applied.
- social-ecological systems
- Approaches that study people and nature together, treating human activity and ecosystems as linked and mutually affecting.
Summarised from the linked release; details can be imperfect — always verify against the original source.