Hua Peng（1956-2018） was born in Dangshan, Anhui. He was a Professor and doctoral student advisor at the School of Geography and Planning at Sun Yat-sen University, and was a expert who receives government funding from the State Council. He was also the adjunct Chairman of the Red Beds and Danxia Landform Working Group of IAG (International Association of Geomorphologists), the Director of the Red Beds and Danxia Landform Group of the Geographical Society of China, the President of the Geological Tourism and Geopark Branch of the Geological Society of China, the Director of the China Danxia World Natural Heritage expert committee, and the Chief Engineer for the Danxiashan World Natural Heritage Global Geopark.Hua Peng was the President of the Research Society of National Danxia Landform Tourism Development, and leaded international Danxia landform academic research. He had been researching Danxia landforms for over 30 years. He successfully presided over the application for Danxiashan to become a Global Geopark in 2003–2004. He won the Ministry of Education’s second prize for science and technology progress in 2006 and an award from Guangdong in 2007 for the project “The research on Sustainable Utilization of Danxia Landform Scenery Resources in Danxiashan”. He successfully presided over six provinces of South China uniting to apply for the World Natural Heritage series “China Danxia” in 2006–2010. He was awarded the First Class Merit Citation by the government of Guangdong province, the Special Contribution Award by the Government of Jiangxi, Zhejiang, Fujian provinces, and the Outstanding Contribution Award by leading the group that applied for World Heritage in six provinces of South China.
