Villagers Prove Harsh Environment No Impediment to Transforming Lives
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CHINA DAILY | GLOBAL EDITION Tuesday, August 4, 2020 | 3 CHINA Villagers prove harsh environment no impediment to transforming lives Farmers turn mountain slopes into paddy terraces in a fragile zone in Guizhou province No Editor’s note: With China set to meet its goal this year of one eliminating extreme poverty before next year’s 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China, this series left looks at the efforts of different areas of the country to erase behind poverty and improve livelihoods. By CAI HONG in Beijing and YANG JUN in Guiyang n the year 2000, Li Tianliang, a farmer in Lengdong, a village in Qianxinan Buyei and Miao autonomous prefec ture in Southwest China’s Guizhou Iprovince, hired eight strong men to carry his 180kg pig to a market at the foot of the mountain. He was hoping the pig would fetch him at least 1,200 yuan ($171). As the pig was bruised during the tough ride, it didn’t get him the expected price. Li managed to get only 400 yuan. areas, helping villagers to improve their The inaccessibility of the village, which is sources of income. located deep in the mountains, made life dif It was found that honeysuckle grew well ficult for the villagers. in these areas. Since the shrub has wellde The village, with an area of about 730 hec veloped roots, it also helps conserve water, tares, is home to several ethic groups such as say experts. Han, Miao, Buyei and Yi. According to some experiments conducted The villagers made a living through farm in Dewo, a town in the prefecture, one honey A photo taken on Monday shows a view of Lengdong, a village in Qianxinan Buyei and Miao autonomous prefecture in ing, livestock breeding or taking up jobs out suckle plant can conserve up to 200 liters of Southwest China’s Guizhou province. XIAO XIONG / FOR CHINA DAILY side of the village. water. It also has branches and leaves that After graduating from high school, Zhu protect karst slopes against erosion. Changguo left Lengdong to work in facto Simple techniques and management are ries and construction sites. needed for its cultivation. While it is a low In 1995, Zhu returned to the village and cost species, it also has high value as one of took the initiative to raise funds for building the most important ingredients in the tradi the infrastructure to supply electricity to tional Chinese medicine. every home in the village. In 2003, Lengdong started growing hon In 2001, he served as the Party head of eysuckle on an area of about 133.3 hectares. Lengdong village, encouraging villagers to In 2009, the villagers built factories to proc build roads, cellars and reservoirs, to grow ess the honeysuckle flowers, setting aside honeysuckles, a shrub with flowers that more land to grow honeysuckle and selling change from white to yellow and red berries, the seedlings to other villages. and to set up factories. The honeysuckle in Lengdong yielded an Responding to the call, the villagers output that was worth 8.30 million yuan in worked hard, transforming the mountain 2019. The village also has a honeysuckle value slopes into paddy terraces. They also grew chain, selling more valueadded products. corn. A total of 53.3 hectares of land were A cooperative and some companies buy brought under cultivation. the honeysuckles that the farmers grow and With villagers building a reservoir, 286 sell them across China and in Southeast Asia. ponds and 386 cisterns, drinking water and In 2019, Shoucao Group, a Chinese com managing of livestock was no longer an pany based in Xingyi, a countylevel city issue. administered by the prefecture, invested 3 Guizhou is a region with a karst land million yuan in a 20hectare garden to grow scape, where the dissolving of the bedrock Dendrobium officinale, which is used as an has created sinkholes, sinking streams, ingredient in TCM. caves, springs and underground rivers. It’s People from the povertystricken families called a fragile zone because it is not suitable in the village were employed by the compa for habitation due to poor soil cover and rap ny to work in the garden. The company also id water loss. ran a cooperative that trained villagers on About 73 percent of Guizhou’s total area is how to grow Dendrobium officinale. made up of karst landscape. For this reason, Lengdong was lifted out of poverty in Workers pick up eggs on a poultry farm in the village on Monday. XIAO XIONG / FOR CHINA DAILY it is called a “karst province”. 2019. Now, the villagers have a per capita Due to the extremely fragile environment annual income of more than 10,000 yuan and a large number of underground caves, it from livestock breeding. Backed by experts, the villagers finally is difficult and expensive to build roads and Guizhou has been one of China’s main drilled a well up to a depth of 276 meters, highways in the region. Therefore, Guizhou battlefields in poverty alleviation. In 2015, which has provided water for people and had remained a “closed province” for a long the province had a povertystricken popula livestock in Lendong and adjoining villa time, and its development was affected. tion of 6.23 million, the highest among all ges. provinces, representing 8.9 percent of the A total of 1.24 million rural residents of Mounting pressure total population. Guizhou cast off poverty in 2019, bringing On the other hand, a large human popula It had a poverty headcount ratio of 18 per down the poverty rate to 0.85 percent, the tion in the karst areas of Guizhou was put cent, higher than the national average by provincial government said. ting pressure on the province’s ecology. 10.8 percent. Li Xinggang, 68, lived with his wife and As a result, Guizhou had long been one of Guizhou’s poverty alleviation efforts are a three children in a 60squaremeter tile the poorest provinces in the country. fulfillment of China’s goal of building a soci roofed house in the village in 1985. He had to Lengdong, with 505 households (1,962 ety that is moderately prosperous in all fetch water from a river that was 5 km from people), is located in one of the karst areas. respects. his home. People from the village used to fetch water President Xi Jinping, determined to alle Farming was his mainstay, but it was at from caves that were 4 kilometers from the viate poverty in Guizhou, pointed out at a the mercy of the weather. Whatever he har village. The water they used to wash their symposium with local Party leaders in 2015 vested could barely feed his family for six face was reused to wash their feet. It was that the success of poverty alleviation pro months. Li had to do odd jobs so he could again used to cook fodder for pigs. grams depended on whether targeted assist buy foodgrains for the family. Despite the poor soil cover, villagers man ance can be provided to beneficiaries. “When hens laid eggs, we sold all of them aged to grow corn on the mountain slopes. During the 19th National Congress of the and bought salt and grains,” Li said. In 1976, each villager had less than 100 kg Communist Party of China in October 2017, of grain. Their per capita income was less Xi joined a panel discussion with a delega Above: A woman Tough living conditions than 600 yuan in 2000. tion from Guizhou and directed officials works on Monday The tough living conditions forced the In the 1980s and 1990s, the villagers from the province to stick to economic in a garden where family to move to a farm more than 100 km moved to other places where they could grow development and ecological protection to Dendrobium offici away, where corn was grown on wasteland grains to fill their stomachs. The local people create a better future for the colorful Guiz nale, an orchid for 10 years that was sufficient to feed them felt the impoverished village could change for hou so that people are rich and ecosystems plant, is grown. for the whole year. the better “if only the stones flowered”. are beautiful. XIAO XIONG / In 1996, Li learned that Lengdong had All villages in the region, including Leng FOR CHINA DAILY electricity and the villagers were using elec dong, sit on stonecovered mountains, First centenary goal Left: Workers are trical appliances. He moved his family back where only bushes grow. Xi said, “We must win the battle against engaged in the to Lengdong. With young women marrying men out poverty to achieve our first centenary goal. construction of a “Thanks to a subsidy of 1,400 yuan from side of their village, some villages were full We have entered a countdown and can’t bridge on an the local authorities, we built a cellar that is of poor bachelors whom no women wanted afford to hesitate or slacken. It’s time to expressway in the source of our drinking water,” Li added. to wed. launch a general offensive”. Xingyi, a county His family joined the village’s campaign to At a conference held in 2010 to highlight To fight poverty, Guizhou relocated peo level city in Gui improve the barren land. Now, the family the plight of Lengdong farmers who worked ple from inhospitable areas and improved zhou province, in has enough grain to eat besides a surplus for hard to improve their living conditions, Liao the infrastructure facilities, including roads.