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Located in the southwest of China, Guizhou Province is at the center of the country’s karst regions. Jagged mountains of limestone and other soft minerals spanning the unique scenery in the province used to be covered with lush greenery, but due to many years of erosion and exhaustive exploitation, many of these areas have gradually become nothing but barren stone.
From 1978 to 2005, stony deserts in southwest China’s karst regions expanded. They have especially hampered economic development for ethnic minorities in Guizhou.
According to statistics from the State Forestry Administration, Guizhou is the province most severely affected by stony desertification in China. In 2005, the areas affected by stony desertification in Guizhou reached 33,100 square km, 18.8 percent of its total territory, which accounted for 26 percent of the country’s total.
Fighting stony desertification tops the agenda of local authorities and is a national priority as well. In 2008, the State Council approved a plan to combat desertification of karst regions in eight southern and southwestern provincial-level regions by increasing investment in environmental improvement and allocating special funds.
By March 2012, 6,615 square km of stony deserts in Guizhou had been under con- trol and on their way to ecological recovery thanks to the efforts of local governments.
Grass and goat
Peng Zhujiang, a 40-year-old villager in Qinglong County in Guizhou’s Qianxinan Buyi and Miao Autonomous Prefecture, herds goats to the grassland in the mountains every day with his wife. Although they are munching on grass, the goats leave their roots untouched, preventing soil erosion.
“Villagers used to grow corn for a living, but we didn’t get a good enough yield on the land and could harvest nothing during years of severe drought,” Peng said.
In the 1990s, due to over-farming and deforestation, this area had almost become a wasteland. According to Peng, the average annual household income of the village in those years was about 10,000 yuan ($1,572).
In 2008, with financial and technical help from the local government, Peng started to raise goats. At the time, the local government had for years been encouraging farmers to give up growing corn and instead engage in goat rearing. In 2000, in order to involve more villagers in a trial program, a special institution was set up in Qinglong and the local government invested 100 million yuan ($15.72 million) in the program.
“At the very beginning, it is very hard to persuade villagers to plant grass for goats to graze,” said Zhang Daquan, a local official in charge of combating stony desertification.“But the mountains took on a new look several years after we planted grass on the deserted area. The small number of villagers who participated in the program earlier earned at least three times of what they earned before. Now, almost no villagers grow corn.”
Before 2000, there were around 2,600 goats in Qinglong. Now, the number is up to 420,000. Zhang revealed that the grass seeds and goats were all imported from New Zealand. “It is a win-win situation. The yearly income of the villagers can increase by three to five times on average, and the vast amount of grass can stop the trend of stony desertification as well,” Zhang said.
A lamb processing business chain is also on the horizon. In August, a mutton packing plant is scheduled to start operation in Qinglong. The facility, jointly funded by Chinese and New Zealand businesses, has a maximum annual processing capacity of 1.2 million lambs.
“Actually the lamb is in great demand already,” said Zhang. “Marketing is not a problem at all. Our mutton tastes pretty good and sells at a high price. Dealers always wait in line to purchase our lamb.”
The grass-and-goat strategy, known as the Qinglong Model, has been spread to other places with the same geographical conditions.
Pepper miracle
Wang Fuchang in Yundongwan Village in Guizhou’s Zhenfeng County told Beijing Review that he could earn 50,000 yuan($7,861) to 60,000 yuan ($9,433) each year planting Chinese peppers.
Experts once considered Zhenfeng totally unfit for human habitation because its expanse of stony deserts. People living in this area survived on 300 tons of government grain allocations every year in the 1990s.
“We tried to plant something here, but it is hard to find even a tiny piece of land,”Wang said. “Barren stone cannot hold earth at all.”
In 1988, Wang decided to move his family to another place to seek a living as he saw no hope of surviving under such harsh conditions. In the following years, he made a living as an auto mechanic in nearby Anshun City.
In 1999, Luo Zeliang, head of Yundongwan, tried to persuade Wang to move back to the village. “Luo told me that many villagers started planting peppers and made money out of it,” said Wang, who didn’t believe at first but finally returned with Luo to verify.
“I was surprised to see the big changes of my old neighbors,” Wang recalled. “Almost every household planting peppers built up new houses and some even bought vehicles.”
Wang moved back in 2000 and started to plant peppers with the help of Luo. In 2001, he made more than 20,000 yuan ($3,147) from peppers and expanded pepper fields from 0.5 to 0.8 hectares the next year.
Besides Wang, now the other 16 families that left Yundongwan in the 1980s and 90s have all moved back.
Hu Mingzhong migrated out of Yundongwan in 1986 and returned in 1996. Now he has more than 3,000 pepper trees and makes more than 60,000 yuan ($9,436) each year.
“Unlike other crops, the roots of pepper trees can stretch deep through the thin layer of earth and into the tight stone cracks,” Luo said. “That is why pepper trees can work here pretty well.”
Now almost every household in Zhenfeng plants peppers. In Dingtan region of the county, there are more than 4,000 hectares of pepper fields. Their combined annual output has reached 1,700 tons and earns more than 80 million yuan ($12.58 million) for local farmers. The forest coverage rate in the area has climbed to 70 percent from 6.7 percent in the 1970s, according to official statistics.
Moneymaking fruit
Bangui Township in Guanling Buyi and Miao Autonomous County sits at the lower part of the mountains. The local government has explored a new way to tackle poverty triggered by stony desertification—plantation of pitaya, also known as dragon fruit.
In Hongyan Village, the mountains are covered with rows and rows of pitaya trees.“The climate here is very suitable to plant pitaya,” said Li Zhigang, Deputy Mayor of Bangui. “It takes three years for a harvest but we can sell it to the market at a very high price.”
Plantation of pitaya began in Bangui in 2005. According to Li, Bangui imported the seeds from Taiwan. “It is even less costly than planting peppers, but the profits are much higher. People can make about 10,000 yuan out of 0.06 hectares of land.”
At first, villagers were hesitant to switch to planting an exotic-looking fruit they had seldom seen before. The local government then spent about five years teaching and helping villagers to cultivate them and provided financial support.
Huang Yuanzhao in Hongyan Village started the plantation in 2007 with his two brothers and invested 140,000 yuan ($22,005) from their own pockets in it plus another 110,000 yuan ($17,290) loaned from the government. In 2011, their 3.13-hectare plantation, mostly land reclaimed from the bare mountains, garnered more than 200,000 yuan($31,430).
“It is not just about money made out of the fruits, the scenery of the endless rows of pitaya trees on the mountains can also become a tourist attraction,” Li said.
Now more than 40 households in Bangui plant pitaya, covering 67 hectares of farmland. Li said that in the following three to five years, pitaya plantation can be another polar industry in the campaign against stony desertification.
From 1978 to 2005, stony deserts in southwest China’s karst regions expanded. They have especially hampered economic development for ethnic minorities in Guizhou.
According to statistics from the State Forestry Administration, Guizhou is the province most severely affected by stony desertification in China. In 2005, the areas affected by stony desertification in Guizhou reached 33,100 square km, 18.8 percent of its total territory, which accounted for 26 percent of the country’s total.
Fighting stony desertification tops the agenda of local authorities and is a national priority as well. In 2008, the State Council approved a plan to combat desertification of karst regions in eight southern and southwestern provincial-level regions by increasing investment in environmental improvement and allocating special funds.
By March 2012, 6,615 square km of stony deserts in Guizhou had been under con- trol and on their way to ecological recovery thanks to the efforts of local governments.
Grass and goat
Peng Zhujiang, a 40-year-old villager in Qinglong County in Guizhou’s Qianxinan Buyi and Miao Autonomous Prefecture, herds goats to the grassland in the mountains every day with his wife. Although they are munching on grass, the goats leave their roots untouched, preventing soil erosion.
“Villagers used to grow corn for a living, but we didn’t get a good enough yield on the land and could harvest nothing during years of severe drought,” Peng said.
In the 1990s, due to over-farming and deforestation, this area had almost become a wasteland. According to Peng, the average annual household income of the village in those years was about 10,000 yuan ($1,572).
In 2008, with financial and technical help from the local government, Peng started to raise goats. At the time, the local government had for years been encouraging farmers to give up growing corn and instead engage in goat rearing. In 2000, in order to involve more villagers in a trial program, a special institution was set up in Qinglong and the local government invested 100 million yuan ($15.72 million) in the program.
“At the very beginning, it is very hard to persuade villagers to plant grass for goats to graze,” said Zhang Daquan, a local official in charge of combating stony desertification.“But the mountains took on a new look several years after we planted grass on the deserted area. The small number of villagers who participated in the program earlier earned at least three times of what they earned before. Now, almost no villagers grow corn.”
Before 2000, there were around 2,600 goats in Qinglong. Now, the number is up to 420,000. Zhang revealed that the grass seeds and goats were all imported from New Zealand. “It is a win-win situation. The yearly income of the villagers can increase by three to five times on average, and the vast amount of grass can stop the trend of stony desertification as well,” Zhang said.
A lamb processing business chain is also on the horizon. In August, a mutton packing plant is scheduled to start operation in Qinglong. The facility, jointly funded by Chinese and New Zealand businesses, has a maximum annual processing capacity of 1.2 million lambs.
“Actually the lamb is in great demand already,” said Zhang. “Marketing is not a problem at all. Our mutton tastes pretty good and sells at a high price. Dealers always wait in line to purchase our lamb.”
The grass-and-goat strategy, known as the Qinglong Model, has been spread to other places with the same geographical conditions.
Pepper miracle
Wang Fuchang in Yundongwan Village in Guizhou’s Zhenfeng County told Beijing Review that he could earn 50,000 yuan($7,861) to 60,000 yuan ($9,433) each year planting Chinese peppers.
Experts once considered Zhenfeng totally unfit for human habitation because its expanse of stony deserts. People living in this area survived on 300 tons of government grain allocations every year in the 1990s.
“We tried to plant something here, but it is hard to find even a tiny piece of land,”Wang said. “Barren stone cannot hold earth at all.”
In 1988, Wang decided to move his family to another place to seek a living as he saw no hope of surviving under such harsh conditions. In the following years, he made a living as an auto mechanic in nearby Anshun City.
In 1999, Luo Zeliang, head of Yundongwan, tried to persuade Wang to move back to the village. “Luo told me that many villagers started planting peppers and made money out of it,” said Wang, who didn’t believe at first but finally returned with Luo to verify.
“I was surprised to see the big changes of my old neighbors,” Wang recalled. “Almost every household planting peppers built up new houses and some even bought vehicles.”
Wang moved back in 2000 and started to plant peppers with the help of Luo. In 2001, he made more than 20,000 yuan ($3,147) from peppers and expanded pepper fields from 0.5 to 0.8 hectares the next year.
Besides Wang, now the other 16 families that left Yundongwan in the 1980s and 90s have all moved back.
Hu Mingzhong migrated out of Yundongwan in 1986 and returned in 1996. Now he has more than 3,000 pepper trees and makes more than 60,000 yuan ($9,436) each year.
“Unlike other crops, the roots of pepper trees can stretch deep through the thin layer of earth and into the tight stone cracks,” Luo said. “That is why pepper trees can work here pretty well.”
Now almost every household in Zhenfeng plants peppers. In Dingtan region of the county, there are more than 4,000 hectares of pepper fields. Their combined annual output has reached 1,700 tons and earns more than 80 million yuan ($12.58 million) for local farmers. The forest coverage rate in the area has climbed to 70 percent from 6.7 percent in the 1970s, according to official statistics.
Moneymaking fruit
Bangui Township in Guanling Buyi and Miao Autonomous County sits at the lower part of the mountains. The local government has explored a new way to tackle poverty triggered by stony desertification—plantation of pitaya, also known as dragon fruit.
In Hongyan Village, the mountains are covered with rows and rows of pitaya trees.“The climate here is very suitable to plant pitaya,” said Li Zhigang, Deputy Mayor of Bangui. “It takes three years for a harvest but we can sell it to the market at a very high price.”
Plantation of pitaya began in Bangui in 2005. According to Li, Bangui imported the seeds from Taiwan. “It is even less costly than planting peppers, but the profits are much higher. People can make about 10,000 yuan out of 0.06 hectares of land.”
At first, villagers were hesitant to switch to planting an exotic-looking fruit they had seldom seen before. The local government then spent about five years teaching and helping villagers to cultivate them and provided financial support.
Huang Yuanzhao in Hongyan Village started the plantation in 2007 with his two brothers and invested 140,000 yuan ($22,005) from their own pockets in it plus another 110,000 yuan ($17,290) loaned from the government. In 2011, their 3.13-hectare plantation, mostly land reclaimed from the bare mountains, garnered more than 200,000 yuan($31,430).
“It is not just about money made out of the fruits, the scenery of the endless rows of pitaya trees on the mountains can also become a tourist attraction,” Li said.
Now more than 40 households in Bangui plant pitaya, covering 67 hectares of farmland. Li said that in the following three to five years, pitaya plantation can be another polar industry in the campaign against stony desertification.