Carrying a Jurassic on me
Chapter 733 - 368: This Kind of Returning Farmland to Forest_1

Chapter 733: Chapter 368: This Kind of Returning Farmland to Forest_1

Certainly, many places have now begun to emphasize the protection of forest resources and vegetation, but it has not developed to the point of needing to recover farmland by afforestation. Even higher authorities do not have this requirement, it’s just an appeal, a slogan that remains on paper.

Every elementary school student has learned the saying "better late than never," but no matter when, people would recite it but fail to remember it in their hearts.

Take Sancha River as an example. Because of the fire that had occurred during the wheat harvesting season in the past, causing losses, now every year, everyone in the township propagates fire prevention. Because security was slightly inferior for a while after severe punishment in previous years, there are occasional campaigns against theft and crime.

The river beside the cattle farm was so polluted that fish could no longer survive, only then did Tanghe County think to sue and control the pollution - even if the lawsuit was won or lost, that factory still opened as usual, until it was flattened by Yan Fei.

Currently, although soil erosion is severe, there hasn’t been any particularly major natural disasters yet, so this policy of converting farmland back into forests and grasslands is treated just as empty talk after being brought up, no one takes it seriously.

Everyone is working together to develop the economy now, if a town instantly plants trees on hundreds and thousands of acres of land, it would directly affect all aspects, even if well managed, no one would praise you. On the contrary, people below might curse you every day by drawing small caricatures, who would be willing to do this?

It’s not that Tanghe County had a high level of awareness and started converting farmland back into forests and grasslands early. Essentially, this problem surprisingly originated from poverty alleviation funds.

Everyone in the province knows, Tanghe County has a large population, in the whole of China, when it comes to which county has the most people, it is always at the top. Another well-known fact is that this county, unflinchingly, remains under the label of a poverty-stricken county, no matter what, it cannot shed this status.

A high population is sometimes not a good thing, in an era where income can only be obtained from the land, the population is large, the land is scarce, and per capita income is low.

Therefore, there are poverty alleviation funds every year, but how these funds should be distributed, is an annual question. Each town claims poverty. One year, during a county meeting discussing how to distribute the poverty alleviation funds, somehow the news leaked out. Two town heads rushed into the meeting room - at that time, both of them wore old cotton coats with exposed cotton stuffing, double-layered shoes with exposed toes, they ran over without opening an umbrella in the cold weather, there was frost on them when they entered.

Although this incident happened a few years ago, no one does this anymore. But the issue of distributing funds for poverty alleviation has always been a big problem. No matter how carefully the funds are distributed, someone will always complain that it’s not fair enough - distributing evenly among the entire town, some argue other towns are wealthier. Distributing according to population, some argue that their land is less. Distributing according to land, some argue that their land is bad and yet the population is still large...

In any case, the county is also in a dilemma. It’s not easy to ask for some poverty alleviation funds by lamenting poverty to the superiors, but when it comes to distributing them, everyone at the bottom cries poverty. No matter what the final result is, there would be some grievances. No matter how it’s distributed, it’s wrong, but one cannot just refuse to ask for it, and once received, it cannot be left undistributed.

So, it’s unclear who suddenly came up with an idea - the name of the person who came up with this idea is definitely confidential, otherwise, if people know for sure, he would be utterly unlucky, his entire village would curse him not to mention, it’s even possible that his ancestors’ graves would be dug up.

This idea is to link the poverty alleviation fund to the practice of converting farmland back into forests. Whichever town plants more trees and grass this year, that town gets a little more.

Although it’s referred to as reforesting farmland, there is actually no reforestation, it’s just encouraging afforestation. Regardless of where the trees are planted, as long as there are many trees, it’s fine. At this time, there was a term for planting fast-growing forests in farmland, such as Paulownia trees. This is called the alternation of agriculture and Tung, it can improve the ecological environment. It is said that it has been widely promoted in many places, but there are already fruit trees in many fields in Tanghe County, so it has not been promoted here.

As for reforesting farmland, no one even mentions it. Who would be so stupid? To ruin good land to plant grass, one must be demented to do so. Even if that land is no good, the harvest you get from planting seeds will always be more than the seeds, right?

Some people say that the poverty alleviation fund can be linked with something else? The main issue is that other things aren’t suitable for linking, one can’t just award the town that’s the worst at contributing public grain with the fund, wouldn’t that just be encouraging everyone to compete to be the model of backwardness?

Planting Paulownia trees is also a good thing for farmland that mainly relies on manual labor. The Paulownia trees can be used in six or seven years, definitely increasing income. But the common people are not happy, who does the tree planted in my field belong to, what if the land is redistributed in these few years? If it belongs to the original owner of the farmland, when this land is divided to others, they’ll complain that your Paulownia tree hinders the growth of crops - although one tree doesn’t seem to affect much, it does have some impact.

As for you saying that planting like this has benefits for the land, and improves the ecology - sorry, we can’t see that. What we can see now, are only these few trees that aren’t mine but are growing in my field, slowing the growth of my crops and affecting my harvest.

You say the common people only care about the present or that their vision is short-sighted, but no matter what, even the best policy will be doubted by most people before the benefits can be seen.

Planting a tree in the field is this difficult, let alone promoting the policies of converting farmland back into forests and grasslands, it’s no different than telling ghost stories.

Originally, it’s all good things. If implemented properly, the county can present it as an achievement and get more rewards. Those who plant trees underneath can have more income in the future. But it’s difficult to promote because of misunderstanding.