Con­sist­ing of eight geo­graph­i­cal clus­ters of pro­tect­ed areas with­in the bound­aries of the Three Par­al­lel Rivers Nation­al Park, in the moun­tain­ous north-west of Yun­nan Province, the 1.7 mil­lion hectare site fea­tures sec­tions of the upper reach­es of three of the great rivers of Asia: the Yangtze (Jin­sha), Mekong and Sal­ween run rough­ly par­al­lel, north to south, through steep gorges which, in places, are 3,000 m deep and are bor­dered by glaciat­ed peaks more than 6,000 m high. The site is an epi­cen­tre of Chi­nese bio­di­ver­si­ty. It is also one of the rich­est tem­per­ate regions of the world in terms of bio­di­ver­si­ty.