The barren hills are covered with greenery, green water and green hills, paving a happy background.
CCTV News:(Reporter Zhang Qi) Dongchuan is a famous "Tiannan Copper Capital" in history. After thousands of years of exploitation and logging, the mountains in Dongchuan have basically become bare. When it comes to Dongchuan 20 years ago, people often associate it with barren land covered in mines, weeds everywhere, and mudslides that cross the river wantonly. "Walking on the top of the mountain with dragons and blowing horns at every ditch" was the truest portrayal of Dongchuan at that time.
Photo courtesy of Dongchuan District Forestry and Grassland Bureau
"We want a blue sky and green mountains, and we want the earth to awaken and the Qingshui River", which has become the aspiration of all Dongchuan people and the dream of Dongchuan people.
However, it is an arduous task to make the barren hills in Dongchuan green. The area of barren hills in Dongchuan is 606,000 mu, and there are more than 100,000 mu of barren hills in Xiaojiang dry-hot valley with a total length of more than 80 kilometers. Due to drought, lack of rain, large evaporation, poor soil layer and poor water conservation ability, the survival rate of newly planted trees is low, and many barren slopes are "afforestation without forest" every year.
Dongchuan forestry workers repeatedly tried to use different methods and tree species for experimental planting, boldly diverted water up the mountain to water seedlings, and explored the soil and water conservation technology of fish scale pit at the bottom of funnel. In recent years, Dongchuan has taken 7,000 acres of barren hills in Daduo Village of Tangdan Town as a demonstration base for drought-resistant afforestation in dry-hot valleys, mainly popularizing these two technologies and planting new Leucaena leucocephala which is drought-resistant and easy to survive, with remarkable results.
In order to plant trees and fill the ecological shortcomings, Dongchuan also spent a lot of money. Twenty years ago, the investment in afforestation per mu was only in 8 yuan, but now, the investment in 800 yuan per mu has increased by 100 times. The local finance in Dongchuan District will allocate 10 million yuan for ecological restoration every year, and at least 30,000 mu will be planted every year, so that the forest coverage rate in Dongchuan will increase by at least 1 percentage point every year.
Through the arduous efforts of Dongchuan District, the ecological restoration has achieved remarkable results. From 2012 to 2018, a total of 246,000 mu of barren hills were afforested, with an average annual afforestation of 37,000 mu, 204,000 mu of returning farmland to forests and 245,000 mu of walnut base construction. By the end of 2018, there were 1,603,700 mu of forest land in the whole region, and the forest coverage rate increased to 33.7%. It is estimated that the forest coverage rate will reach 38% by the end of 2019.
Photo courtesy of Dongchuan District Forestry and Grassland Bureau
Today, the bare peaks in Dongchuan District are long gone, and the trees on both sides of the road are dense, clean and tall. The mountains are green, the sky is blue, the water is blue, and the green mountains and green hills have also brought real Jinshan Yinshan to the people. The ecological dividend is benefiting the local people, and the villagers’ days are getting more and more prosperous.
Walking into Xindianfang Village, Tuobuka Town, Dongchuan, the small saplings all over the mountains attract attention, and the economic crops such as navel orange, soft-seeded pomegranate and pepper grow gratifying, which is a vivid exploration and practice of developing the under-forest economic model in Dongchuan at present. Combine returning farmland to forests, economic planting under forests and large-scale cooperatives to achieve the greatest combination of ecological benefits, social benefits and economic benefits.
Photo courtesy of Dongchuan District Propaganda Department
Now Xindianfang Village has planted 400 mu of soft-seeded pomegranate and 500 mu of navel orange. The first batch of 200 acres of navel oranges have all borne fruit, and the estimated economic income is more than 300,000 yuan. Next year, the soft-seeded pomegranate will bear fruit officially, and the estimated economic income is more than 200,000 yuan. The two industries have become the pillar industries of Xindian Fangcun, which have brought protection to the economic benefits of farmers in the later period.
"Now this blue sky is full of green hills, with clear rivers and fish as companions, and forests all over the mountains and rivers. Birds are singing freely in the forest, and cattle and sheep have found the grass mountain. We sow hope and weave a green shirt for our hometown … …” The green dream of Dongchuan people has come true.