June 5 is World Environment Day, and this year's theme focuses on land restoration, desertification and drought resilience.

Strengthening comprehensive desertification prevention and control and deepening the advancement of key ecological projects such as the "Three-North" program bear on China's ecological security, on building a strong nation, and on the sustainable development of the Chinese nation.

On June 6, 2023, General Secretary Xi Jinping presided over a symposium on strengthening comprehensive desertification prevention and control and advancing key ecological projects such as the "Three-North" program, and delivered an important speech in which he stressed "striving to create new miracles in China's desertification prevention and control in the new era" and proposed "striving to fight a tough battle of the 'Three-North' program in about 10 years."

Over the past year, the tough battle of the "Three-North" program has been accelerated around the key and difficult points of desertification control, and ever richer greenery has been spreading across the northern border of the motherland.

Everyone joins hands to fight a battle of annihilation

The June sun blazes like fire. Watching the last stretch of mobile dunes east of the county seat also firmly pinned down by grass grids, Sun Guo, director of the Forestry and Grassland Service Center of Yanchi County, Wuzhong City, Ningxia, let out a long breath; a heart that had been on edge for more than 20 years was finally at ease.

This stretch of yellow sand spans both Ningxia and Inner Mongolia and belongs to the Mu Us Sandy Land.

In the 1980s, desertified land accounted for more than 82 percent of Yanchi County's area. When a fierce wind passed through overnight, sand piled as high as rooftops. After decades of effort, more than 2 million mu of severely desertified land across the county was clothed in green again, leaving only this stretch of dunes bordering Otog Front Banner of Ordos City, Inner Mongolia, still untreated—a glaring expanse that had become a "burden on the mind" for Sun Guo.

"The difficulty is that the dunes straddle provincial borders," Sun Guo said. In the past, desert control was often organized by administrative division, with each area tackling its own section, which made it easy to leave blind spots and gaps in forest and grass belts at the junctions of some provinces, cities and counties. Although small in area, these directly affected the effectiveness of desert control and became a tough point in the "Three-North" program.

General Secretary Xi Jinping proposed strengthening regional joint prevention and joint control, breaking down administrative boundaries, and pursuing coordinated planning of desert margins and hinterlands, upwind and downwind areas, and sand source areas and transport-path areas, so as to build an ecological protection network combining points, lines and areas.

Acting upon the call, they joined forces to tackle the challenge! Last October, five localities in the four provinces and regions of Shaanxi, Gansu, Inner Mongolia and Ningxia jointly signed the "Cooperation Agreement on Regional Joint Prevention and Joint Control in the Mu Us Sandy Land," turning solitary efforts into collective progress and weaving a net from the periphery toward the center to lock down the sand.

In the month after the agreement was signed, Yanchi County and Otog Front Banner "moved toward each other." The more than 3,000 mu of sandy land invested in and treated by Yanchi County was recently completed, of which more than 1,000 mu lies within Otog Front Banner. Not far away, in the Erdaochuan work area of joint prevention and joint control among Inner Mongolia, Shaanxi and Ningxia in the Mu Us Sandy Land of Otog Front Banner, local farmers and herdsmen are busy planting sand willow to accelerate the construction of an upwind barrier belt.

Sun Guo told reporters that when Yanchi County's desert control team first entered Inner Mongolia, there was a small "interlude." A few villagers, worried about boundary disputes, stepped forward to stop the workers: "This is our land. Once you treat it, will it become yours?" Cadres at the grassroots level in both places patiently cleared up the misunderstanding: "Of course the land remains each side's own, but before the harm of sand there is no distinction between yours and mine. Let everyone join hands to fight a battle of annihilation—when the environment improves, everyone benefits." Today, the forestry and grassland departments of both places have agreed to jointly ban grazing and to properly manage and protect the hard-won results of the treatment.

Since the tough battle of the "Three-North" program began, with the coordination and promotion of the National Forestry and Grassland Administration and other departments, new prospects for joint prevention and joint control have continued to expand: not only has the battle area around the "Jizi Bend" of the Yellow River carried out joint prevention and joint control around the Mu Us Sandy Land, but Gansu and Inner Mongolia have jointly built four major blocking defense lines to prevent the Badain Jaran Desert and the Tengger Desert from "shaking hands." Qinghai, Gansu and Xinjiang have also deployed blocking points around their respective major sandstorm mouths, creating a new pattern of concerted efforts.

Letting new seedling varieties take root in the sand

In the demonstration area for new desert-control seedling varieties in Hanggin Rear Banner, Bayannur City, Inner Mongolia, within more than 400 mu of grass grids, sand buckwheat and four-wing saltbush planted more than two months ago have mostly grown to about 40 centimeters and put out side branches, presenting a scene of lush greenery.

Yang Rui, director of the Hanggin Rear Banner Desert Control Station, was guiding technicians in planting newly delivered seedlings: "When planting seedlings, be sure to plant deep enough, keep the seedlings upright, firm the soil, and water sufficiently. Water must be injected from all around to ensure moisture."

"These are all new varieties we introduced, and we treasure them dearly!" Yang Rui told reporters that in the past some places planted a single species, caragana, and after several decades these trees have begun to enter a "retirement period" en masse. In addition, the traditional shrub varieties planted were not strongly salt-alkali tolerant or drought tolerant, so survival rates were not high.

"Some aging and degraded desert plants have lost their sand-fixing function, and dunes that had already been treated and fixed begin to move again. We can only replant year after year where plants are missing or rows are broken, but the pace of repair cannot keep up with the pace of degradation, and we worry all the time that desertification will strike back," Yang Rui said.

What to plant, how to plant, and where to plant are all key issues that must be solved in the tough battle.

General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out that "we must persist in scientific desert control and comprehensively improve the quality and stability of desert ecosystems" and that "we must scientifically choose vegetation restoration models and rationally configure the types and density of forest and grass vegetation."

Last August, the Three-North Engineering Research Institute was unveiled and established at the Desert Forestry Experimental Center of the Chinese Academy of Forestry in Dengkou County, Bayannur City, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, bringing together advantageous scientific research forces in the field of desertification prevention and control in China. The Hanggin Rear Banner Forestry and Grassland Bureau immediately invited experts from the institute to conduct on-site "diagnosis and treatment" and write a "prescription": introduce "pioneer" tree species that are drought tolerant and salt-alkali tolerant, while increasing plant diversity and enhancing the stability of the forest and grass system.

Yang Rui led teams to Gansu, Ningxia and other neighboring provinces and regions for study and investigation many times, and finally in March this year reached cooperation with an agriculture and forestry planting professional cooperative in Ningxia to jointly build a demonstration area for new desert-control seedling varieties suited to the arid region of northwest China—with the other side providing seedlings, technical support and other assistance, and introducing more than 20 kinds of desert shrubs for sand-fixation trials.

Recently, seedling planting has been nearing completion, and aerial sowing of grass seed will follow soon. "At present, the survival rate appears to be above 90 percent," Yang Rui told reporters with a face full of joy, adding that if the trial planting succeeds, the plan this autumn is to promote a "composite" forest and grass management model on 1,000 mu to build a more solid ecological barrier.

Turning "human-wave tactics" into machinery "taking the field"

At the Xibulong Forestry Management and Protection Center in Urad Rear Banner, Bayannur City, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, four tracked sand-pressing machines are "transplanting rice seedlings" in the sandy land—each sand-pressing machine, the size of a small pushcart, is fitted at the front with a large gear 80 centimeters in diameter. For every meter the machine advances, the large gear precisely "plants" the rice straw and stalks that have already been evenly spread on the sand into the sandy ground. Before long, strips of golden sand barriers are "woven" into place, binding the dunes firmly.

"We'll finish setting the grass grids before autumn, and then we can plant seedlings. Since the beginning of this year, our desertification prevention and control has been mechanized, and the operating speed is more than three times faster than the previous purely manual work," introduced Du Yongjun, director of the management and protection center. Urad Rear Banner has a short afforestation window: surface temperatures as high as 40 degrees Celsius in summer will scorch seedlings to death, and a few strong winds in winter will bury saplings under shifting sand. Only the month and a half at the turn of spring and summer and one month in autumn are suitable for planting seedlings.

"In the past we did not know what kind of machinery was suitable for operating in the heart of the desert, and setting grass grids and planting seedlings always relied on manual labor, with very low efficiency," Du Yongjun said. Urad Rear Banner has more than 20.65 million mu of desertified land, of which only more than 4.59 million mu has been treated. The remaining treatment tasks are heavy and difficult, and many places have no roads at all. Relying solely on people carrying grass and trees in on their backs takes too long. "'Human-wave tactics' can no longer meet the needs of desertification prevention and control in the new era."

Last October, the National Forestry and Grassland Administration held a demonstration event for advanced machinery and equipment for the tough battle of the "Three-North" program at the Xibulong Forestry Management and Protection Center. A batch of advanced and applicable desertification prevention and control machinery and equipment, including sand barrier laying machines, drones and all-terrain transport vehicles, were showcased together. Seeing that sand-pressing machinery could move over rolling dunes as if on flat ground, Du Yongjun's confidence doubled: "To tackle the remaining desert, we must use machinery!"

After the event, the National Forestry and Grassland Administration donated 30 pieces of production equipment to the Xibulong Forestry Management and Protection Center. Later, the center also sent people out to investigate the market and successively introduced 16 pieces of various mechanical equipment, including sand-pressing machines and saxaul planters, from Wuwei in Gansu and Hohhot in Inner Mongolia. With the help of science and technology, the efficiency of desertification prevention and control has been greatly improved.

"Mechanically pressing sand barriers is not only much faster, but the straw can also be pressed down to a uniform depth of 15 centimeters, giving stronger wind resistance and sand fixation," Du Yongjun said. Up to now, the Xibulong Forestry Management and Protection Center has implemented sand pressing and afforestation with new machinery and equipment on 2,600 mu.

Today, drones transporting seedlings, sand barrier laying machines, sand-fixing machines and various other types of machinery are increasingly used in the battle areas of the "Three-North" program. The power of science and technology continues to help improve the effectiveness of desert control and extend the green map of the northern border of the motherland.