The Causes, Evaluation And Strategies Of Desertification In Beijing And Tianjing Regions In P.R. China

Land desertification in China is very severe, endangering the living space ofChina. An annual rate of desertified land expansion is 3 436 km~2, equaling to amedium- size county in China. At present, desertified land area amounts to 1174×106 km~2, accounting for 18% of the total land territory, or 10 times as large as thearea of Guangdong Province. Population of 100 million, 214×104 villages andtownships are directly affected, with an annual direct economic loss of RMB 54billion yuan. The sandy desertification expansion is mainly caused by natural factorsand human activities. Overgrazing of grassland, indiscriminate reclamation ofecologically sensitive lands for grain production, deforestation and excessivefuelwood collection, digging of herbal plants and irrational use of water resource,being the results of the human being's pressure on ecological environment, are thefive main human factors causing sandy desertification. Concluding from theprevious experiences as well as lessons learned since 1949 in combatingdesertification, desertification combating must deal with the root causes of sandydesertification, focusing on human-centered measures and comprehensiveapproaches as key solution. The controlling activities should fully take into accountlocal farmers and herders' requirements of living and development, which should bethe basic consideration, and take comprehensive measures including measures offorestry, agriculture, grassland, water resources, rural energy, ecological migration,etc. Desertification combating should take protection as the first priority and keepprevention as the key measure. Different types of land should be treated withdifferent policies accordingly, and "Three Shelterbelts" should be set up to preventland from desertifying. As for substantial measures, firstly, the natural vegetation inthe 8 Deserts and 4 Desertified lands should be protected with sand-fixing desertspecies, especially dry-land- dependent arbor, shrubbery, such as Populusdriversifolia, Haloxylon ammodendron.; secondly, larges cale forest and grasslandshelterbelts should be set up, according to the nature of different kinds of damages;thirdly, desertified croplands should be converted to forests, desertified pastoral areas should be enclosed for regeneration, and oasis croplands should be protectedwith optimized forest shelterbelts. Quality and fund management are key toimplementing national sandy desertification combating projects. The check andacceptance measures should be strengthened, and reimbursement managementsystem should be applied. Quality monitoring and controlling should be executedthrough the whole process of projects, as for each phase from designing, planning toimplementing. The responsibility system of government officials should be applied.The tasks, objectives, responsibilities, cash and food subsidies should be allocatedto each household, and contracts should be signed with them. The bottom- upsupervising system should be set up through the means of inspection-and-checkcards and cash-and-food allocation cards. The responsibility system composed ofadministrative leaders, technical heads and farmerPherder responsibility rulesshould be set up, so that obligations and rights, rewards and punishments areclarified. China's course of combating desertification will surely achieve itsambitious objectives.