Drought Plagues China's Top Grain Base
by Li Ping
From Nation, page 9, The Economic Observer issue no. 333, September 17, 2007
Original article in Chinese: http://www.eeo.com.cn/eobserve/eeo/jjgcb/2007/09/14/83189.html

Yushu County, 100 kilometers away from Changchun, the capital of Jilin province, enjoys a reputation as China's biggest granary-- a title that it has basked in since in 2004. That year it produced 2.3 billion kilograms and was named the "National Model County Grain Producer". Two years later, the output had risen by around a hundred million kilograms. But today, Yushu faces a drought the likes of which comes only once in a hundred years, and grain output has fallen steeply.

At noon on September 12, in the Chengfa village in Yushu County, Zhang Shucai loaded corn straws into a wheelbarrow. "It"s no use leaving them in the fields. We might as well bring them home to feed the cattle", he says.

Because the high price of corn last year, he leased almost two and a half acres of land solely for planting corn. "Last year, I only planted corn in less than a two acre field and harvested 10,000 kg. In the end I earned more than 8,000 yuan on that crop," says Zhang. "But this year I'll be happy to harvest just 1,000 kg. I can easily count the number of corn cobs."

This year"s output was only 10 percent of those of normal years. "If the output is less than 20 percent of the average output during previous years, we classify it as a 'no harvest' year," says Yang Shujiu, the top agronomist for Jilin province.

Meanwhile, officials of Yushu maintain that Chengfa's situation was not representative of all of Yushu.

Meteorological data shows that the drought has spread throughout Jilin province since the planting period at the end of April, and can be divided into three phases.