Get reliable science

Rangelands, which comprise more than 40 percent of China’s land
surface area, are an important natural resource that provides a direct livelihood for at least 39 million people. Although the importance of rangelands
has been recognized for millennia, during the latter part of the 20
th
Century
China’s rangelands have been subject to over-use by a growing population
that is dependent on this natural resource for their livelihood and land-use
changes that have diminished productivity and promoted degradation. The first
internationally funded agricultural project was initiated in the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region in 1981. In 1985, the Yihenoer Pilot Demonstration
Area was established to demonstrate methods of rangeland management and
livestock production facilitating sustainable use of rangelands. An ecological
inventory of rangeland vegetation compiled over three years from ecological
monitoring points indicated that rangeland condition was degrading. The
primary reasons for deteriorating rangeland condition were overstocking
and conversion of rangeland to rainfed cropland. In 2003, the Yihenoer Pilot
Demonstration Area was revisited by Canadian and American range scientists.
Evaluation and comparison with information obtained in 1987 indicated
that rangelands of the Yihenoer Pilot Demonstration Area had continued to
degrade, grass steppe rangelands were less productive, and that conversion
of rangelands to rainfed cropland was continuing. The authors recommend
that a “bottom-up” rangeland management planning program designed to
integrate actual land users with well defined and rational “top-down” government agricultural policies be implemented in the northern pastoral region of
China or degradation and loss of rangelands will continue.
(source: abstract)