FOR ALL THE EARTH, FOR ALL TIME
At Oris, we remain dedicated to conserving this planet. A new project with the Changjiang Conservation Foundation picks up the story
YANGTZE JIANGTUN LIMITED EDITION
This 1,249-piece limited-edition supports the conservation of the critically endangered Yangtze finless porpoise
WITH A PURPOSE
The new Yangtze Jiangtun Limited Edition is based on our Aquis Date 43.50 mm and created in partnership with the Changjiang Conservation Foundation
We’re delighted to introduce the new Yangtze Jiangtun Limited Edition. The watch has been produced with our new partner, China’s Changjiang Conservation Foundation, which is working to study and conserve the critically endangered Yangtze finless porpoise. This is a performance watch with a real purpose. The story of the partnership is told through a number of special details found in the watch. Most prominent is the dial, which is crafted from a blue-green mother-of-pearl, a material chosen because of the way it captures and reflects light like the surface of the Yangtze River. Mother-of-pearl is a delicate, brittle material prone to cracking, but using a precise printing process, we’ve added a wave pattern to it, inspired by the echo sound waves of the Yangtze finless porpoise’s high-frequency, narrow-band ultrasonic clicks, which it relies on for communication and navigation in the river’s cloudy waters.
The story continues on the case back (see pages 8 and 12), with engravings of a Yangtze finless porpoise and the limited-edition number, from 1 to 1,249, representing the number of the aquatic mammal thought to be left in existence. Behind these is the Aquis Date 43.50 mm, our high-performance, highly versatile contemporary dive watch. It has a stainless steel case and tapered three-link metal bracelet, lumed hands and hour markers, a uni-directional rotating bezel with a tungsten insert and minutes scale, and a screw-down crown with protection. It’s water-resistant to 30 bar (300 metres) and runs on an automatic Swiss Made mechanical movement
A RIVER OF HOPE
Dr Qian, good to meet you. Tell us a little about yourself and your role. My name is Qian Zhengyi, and I graduated from the Institute of Hydrobiology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, majoring in Yangtze finless porpoise conservation ecology. I currently work at CCF as Project Director and Deputy Secretary-General. My main job is designing the oundation’s nvironmental protection projects, raising funds and implementing them, and engaging the public to contribute to the protection of the Yangtze River.
And tell us about the Changjiang Conservation Foundation (CCF): when was it founded and why? The Yangtze River Ecological Protection Foundation (now the CCF) was established in 2016 by a number of parties with a shared vision, and is the first privately initiated local environmental non-public fundraising foundation in the Hubei Province. CCF is committed to the protection of the Yangtze River, focusing on flagship species such as the Yangtze finless porpoise, Chinese sturgeon, and Baer’s pochard. It aims to build a socialised conservation platform involving government, research institutions, charitable enterprises, NGOs and the public, fostering the growth of grassroots environmental NGOs, and uniting more social forces to address climate change, thus contributing to the ecological protection and sustainable development of the Yangtze River.
