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

Period

Severity of degradation – Inner Mongolia

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 overgrazingSeasonality is an issue

Province / AR Seasonal grassland type Actual Stocking Capacity as a % of

Theoretical Stocking Capacity

Warm season grasslands 107%

Cold season grasslands 183%

Qinghai

All grasslands 191%

Warm season grasslands

124%

Cold season grasslands 377%

Tibet

All grasslands 242%

Warm season grasslands

164%

Cold season grasslands 226%

Xinjiang

All grasslands 249%

Inner Mongolia

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

Mongolia Tibet Gansu Qinghai Xinjiang

Av. rural incomes for province – rank in China 17 29 30 26 25

Pastoralists in pastoral counties

Income as a % of av. rural incomes 115% 119% 110% 122% 117%

Pastoral activity as % of incomes 99 81 74 99 70

Pastoralists in semi-pastoral counties

Income as a % of av. rural incomes 81% 115% 90% 100% 79%

Pastoral activity as % of incomes 83 35 32 88 41

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

Over-stocking ofgrasslands

Grasslanddegradation &

cultivation

Decliningresource base

Populationpressure

Low productivity

Low incomes

Households &collectives respond

by increasinglivestock numbers

• 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

Edicts

Implementation & actual measures

Programs

Legislation

SCGrasslandOpinionMoA

GrasslandPlan

Grassland-livestockbalance

managementmethod

Anti-desertification

law

Live-stocklaw

Agricul-turallaw

Grass-landlaw

Grassland-fire

preventionregulations

Regulations & standardsGrassland-degradationmonitoringtechnical

rules

NomadSettlement

ArtificialGrassland

Construction

GrasslandNatural

ProtectedArea

Combatingdesertifi-

cation

Beijing-Tianjin

Desertifi-cation

Reducelivestock

returngrasslands

FencingDisaster

control andprevention

NaturalGrasslands

revegetation &Construction

Pastoralwater

hydrology

sets direction

provideslegislativeframework

provides funding& sets particularparameters

reflectsincentives& circum-stances

Horizontal co-ordination acrossregulations and programs

Top-downdirection

Bottom-up imple-mentation

Vertical co-ordination

acrossadministrative

levels &instrumentspecificity

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

0

1000

2000

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5000

6000

Jul-00

Jan-01

Jul-01

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Jul-02

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'000 h

ead

Cattle Goats Sheep

Inner Mongolia mid and end year stock numbersSource: Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region Bureau of Statistics (various years)

• 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

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 • As discussed above

– The development of effective local groups (associations, cooperatives)• 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

Centralisation-decentralisation (zhua-fang) cycles in grasslands management

Central Planning era - 1950-80s Post reform era - 1980-1990s 2000-mid term future Mid-longer term future

Centr

alisa

tion

Dece

ntrali

satio

n

CentralPlanning era

HPRS, marketingreforms

Policy & legalinterventions

Increased mangementcapacity required

- on-farm and off-farm

2 (b). Nomad settlement

Inner

Mongolia Tibet Gansu Qinghai Xinjiang

Pastoralists in pastoral counties

% settled households – 2005 100 16 88 93 77

% change in % of settled households 2000-2005 1 -325 6 19 8

Pastoralists in semi-pastoral counties

% settled households – 2005 100 56 12 75 79

% change in % of settled households 2000-2005 0 48 --- -19 90

Source: Animal Husbandry Yearbook, 2001, 2006

• And many more cases of resettlement