People living in the Dingxi area in northwest China’s Gansu
Province have found a best way to shake off poverty: develop
industries adaptable to local conditions.
In
Dingxi, known for its poverty, the local government has adopted
policies encouraging the development of private businesses,
processing industries which can help more local people become
wealthy and cultivation of traditional Chinese medicines, potatoes
and other products suitable to local conditions.
Sun Quande, 69, a farmer in the Laoya Village of Sigou Township,
Minxian County, is one of the beneficiaries of the local government
policies.
Ten years ago, Sun roamed about and begged for food. Now, he has
built a courtyard with eight rooms. Last year, Sun’s family earned
more than 30,000 yuan by planting angelica, the root of Co Donopsis
Pilosula, the root of membranous mil vetch and other traditional
Chinese medicines.
The angelica of Minxian County sells very well on the China market
and in southeast Asia.
Cultivation of traditional Chinese medicines not only has changed
the life of Sun, but also turned the Laoya Village into a wealthy
village.
Statistics show that last year, the per capita industrial income of
Dingxi farmers was 910 yuan, or 72 percent of the per capita net
income in the same year. A group of township and private
enterprises have absorbed 200,000 surplus rural laborers in the
area.
By
the end of last year, all the townships, 99.9 percent of the
villages and 87 percent of the poverty-stricken population in the
Dingxi area have become well-fed.
Currently, Dingxi has planted 158,670 hectares of yam, accounting
for nearly 50 percent of the provincial total and one-tenth of the
national total, respectively. The land area of traditional Chinese
medicine totals 56,000 hectares, of which plantation of angelic
accounts for 70 percent of the national total.
Local officials said that Dingxi will be built into China’s biggest
base for yam breeding, production and processing and the largest
base in northwest China for medicinal materials production and
processing, and flower planting.
(People’s Daily 06/28/2001)