DHAKA: China’s campaign to bulldoze mountains to create land to build on could cause extensive environmental problems.

Scientists say, reports the BBC.

Researchers from Chang’an University in China have warned that dozens of mountains have already been flattened - and this is causing air and water pollution, soil erosion and flooding.

They say that this activity is happening on an unprecedented scale.

They report their concerns in the journal Nature.

Prof Peiyue Li, from Chang’an University’s School of Environmental Science and Engineering, said, ‘Because there have been no land creation projects like this before in the world, there are no guidelines’.

China’s cities are expanding rapidly as its economy grows, and moving mountains is one way to supply more land for development.

About one-fifth of the country’s population lives in mountainous areas.

Around the country, in cities such as Chongqing, Shiyan, Yichang, Lanzhou and Yan'an, dozens of hilltops have been leveled.

The soil and rock is then used to fill in valleys, and overall this has so far created hundreds of square kilometers of flat terrain.

BDST: 2150 HRS, JUNE 05, 2014