An assessment of China’s approach
to grassland degradation & livelihood problems
in the pastoral region
Scott Waldron, Colin Brown & John Longworth
China Agricultural Economics Group
The University of Queensland
www.nrsm.uq.edu.au/caeg
Presentation
1.
The problem
•
•
1 (a). Grassland degradation
1 (b). Pastoral livelihoods
2.
The “fixes”
•
•
•
2 (a). Technical fixes
2 (b). Administrative fixes
2 (c). Management fixes
3.
Assessment
•
More emphasis needed on the latter - “management fixes”
1 (a). Levels of grassland degradation
Severity of degradation – Inner Mongolia
Period
Light
Medium
High
1980s
47%
35%
17%
2003
31%
37%
32%
Source: Lu (2005)
1 (a) Causes of degradation
• Non-livestock grazing pressure
– Rodents
– Insects
• Exposure of topsoil
– Herb picking
– Rip lines for tree planting & artificial grasses
– Cultivation / land reclamation !!!!
• But consensus that over-grazing of livestock is the
main cause!!!!
1 (a) Levels of overgrazing
Seasonality is an issue
Province / AR
Qinghai
Tibet
Xinjiang
Inner Mongolia
Seasonal grassland type
Actual Stocking Capacity
as a % of
Theoretical Stocking Capacity
Warm season grasslands
107%
Cold season grasslands
183%
All grasslands
191%
Warm season grasslands
124%
Cold season grasslands
377%
All grasslands
242%
Warm season grasslands
164%
Cold season grasslands
226%
All grasslands
249%
All grasslands
330%
Source: Lu (2006), with updates and re-estimates as explained in Brown et al. (2008, Table 2.7).
• Winter-spring grasslands heavily over-grazed
• Summer grasslands less heavily grazed & sometimes under-grazed
1 (b). Pastoral incomes
Inner
Av. rural incomes for province – rank in China
Mongolia
Tibet
Gansu
Qinghai
Xinjiang
17
29
30
26
25
115%
119%
110%
122%
117%
99
81
74
99
70
81%
115%
90%
100%
79%
83
35
32
88
41
Pastoralists in pastoral counties
Income as a % of av. rural incomes
Pastoral activity as % of incomes
Pastoralists in semi-pastoral counties
Income as a % of av. rural incomes
Pastoral activity as % of incomes
Source: China Animal Husbandry Yearbook, 2006
1 (b). Pastoral livelihoods
• But income data masks other livelihood determinants
• Pockets of poverty
• Lack of access to
– Services (education, health, medical)
– & infrastructure (housing, power, roads)
• Justification for nomad settlement & resettlement
1 (a,b). The grassland degradation–low
income cycle
Households &
collectives respond
by increasing
livestock numbers
Low incomes
Low productivity
Over-stocking of
grasslands
Population
pressure
Grassland
degradation &
cultivation
Declining
resource base
• How is China attempting to break the cycle?
• How can this approach be improved?
2. “Fixes” to break the grassland-livelihood cycle
• China turning attention to urgent problems
– Rmb100 billion investment in the grasslands from 1998 to 2005
– In the full range of programs that impact on grasslands
• “Fixes” can be classed as:
– Technical
– Administrative
– Management
2 (a). Technical measures
• To increase grassland productivity
– Grassland seeding and improvement
• To reduce non-livestock grazing pressure
– Rodent and insect control
• To exclude livestock and secure property rights
– Fencing
• Other infrastructure
– E.g. Dips, market places and shearing sheds
• To intensify livestock systems !!!!!!
– Pen-feeding, feed, flock structures and breeding
2 (b). Administrative fixes
• Technical fixes complemented by
strengthening of administrative measures
• On the basis that local level systems
(collective-individual co-management) have
failed
• So the State is assuming control!
2 (b) Policy and legislative framework
sets direction
Edicts
SC
Grassland
MoA Opinion
Grassland
Plan
Top-down
direction
Legislation
Agricultural
law
Vertical coordination
across
administrative
levels &
instrument
specificity
AntiGrassLivedesertif
land
stock
ication
law
law
law
provides
legislative
framework
Regulations & standards
Grasslandlivestock
balance
management
method
Grasslandfire
prevention
regulations
Grasslanddegradation
monitoring
technical
rules
provides funding
& sets particular
parameters
Programs
Bottomup implementation
Grassland
Natural
Protected
Area
Pastoral
water
hydrology
Artificial
Grassland
Construction
Natural
Grasslands
revegetation &
Construction
Reduce
Combating
livestock
desertifireturn
cation
grasslands
Nomad
Settlement
BeijingTianjin
Desertification
Disaster
control and
prevention
Implementation & actual measures
Horizontal co-ordination across
regulations and programs
Fencing
reflects
incentives
& circumstances
2 (b). “Reduce livestock return grasslands”
• Set aside program like “Grain for Green”
• Grazing bans & compensation payments
– Whole year bans, whole year pen-feeding
– Or seasonal bans – especially spring grasslands
– Average of 5 years per area / household
– Will be rolled out throughout the entire pastoral region!!!
2 (a,b). Technical & administrative fixes:
• Designed to get people & livestock off the grasslands!!!
– Intensify livestock systems
– Settlement & resettlement
– Increase off-farm labour, migration & on-leasing
• Like the rest of rural China!!!
2 (a,b). Technical & administrative fixes
• Provide immediate solutions to immediate problems
• But it is simply not logistically possible to implement,
enforce & maintain over 400 million ha. of variable and
inaccessible county
• Need to be complemented with long-term, bottom-up
measures
• i.e. Termed as management fixes
2 (c). Management fixes
• Seasonal turnoff cycles reduce pressure on cold season grasslands
• But in the context of an increase in year-end livestock numbers
• Maintains pressure on grasslands &/or cultivated land
6000
5000
'000 head
4000
3000
2000
1000
0
Jul00
Jan01
Jul01
Jan02
Jul02
Cattle
Jan03
Jul03
Goats
Jan04
Jul04
Jan05
Jul05
Sheep
Inner Mongolia mid and end year stock numbers
Source: Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region Bureau of Statistics (various years)
2 (c). Household level production decisions
• More responsive management practices include:
– Increasing turnoff rates of offspring – for slaughter & to agricultural areas for
finishing
– Culling unproductive breeders – animal selection
• Trials / modelling show that destocking/selection can be offset by productivity
gains – income neutral or gains
– To increase livestock value per unit grazing pressure
• But these initiatives require
– Change in “traditional systems” (while maintaining “indigenous knowledge”)
– Better farm management capacity - empowerment of herders
– Which are under-emphasised in State extension & training programs
• However not all households will be able to adapt
– Zhuanyi & on-leasing
– Which involves another series of skills, language
& training issues
2 (c). Integration of households into markets
•
Targeting production
–
To meet the demands of specific markets in which pastoral areas have a comparative advantage
•
–
•
E.g. Hot Pot, green food, textile markets
These can be higher value markets and can increase household revenues
But meeting these market demands requires
–
Better farm management skills
•
–
The development of effective local groups (associations, cooperatives)
•
–
As discussed above
For the production & assembly of homogeneous lines of product
The development of an efficient marketing system
•
That engenders price-grade differentials
•
All of which are highly undeveloped in the pastoral region & largely neglected
•
Initiatives required
Decentralisation
Centralisation
Centralisation-decentralisation (zhua-fang)
cycles in grasslands management
Central
Planning era
Central Planning era - 1950-80s
HPRS, marketing
reforms
Policy & legal
interventions
Post reform era - 1980-1990s
2000-mid term future
Increased mangement
capacity required
- on-farm and off-farm
Mid-longer term future
2 (b). Nomad settlement
Inner
Mongolia
Tibet
Gansu
Qinghai
Xinjiang
100
16
88
93
77
1
-325
6
19
8
100
56
12
75
79
0
48
---
-19
90
Pastoralists in pastoral counties
% settled households – 2005
% change in % of settled households 2000-2005
Pastoralists in semi-pastoral counties
% settled households – 2005
% change in % of settled households 2000-2005
Source: Animal Husbandry Yearbook, 2001, 2006
• And many more cases of resettlement