China desertification check-in

The Chinese government has planted billions of trees and imposed strict regulations on land use in an attempt to stem the encroachment of desert into agricultural lands. After years of optimistic public relations statements, the government is now sounding the retreat and relocating farmers so that their land can be planted with grasses that, hopefully, will accomplish what previous efforts have not. Here's the story as reported on Treehugger.

Experts have laid the blame for the increased desertification alternately at the feet of deforestation and overfarming, though some are now concerned that global warming could play a larger role in the near future — a consequence of the melting Tibetan glaciers.

Does Tree Planting Count?

Planting trees deliberately would seem to be an example of taking action in the face of climate change, right?

For at least 30 years I've accepted the premise that planting trees was good for the environment in general, and helpful at stemming global warming in particular. Not only do trees anchor the soil and hold moisture there, they provide homes and "services" to other critters, shade for cooling the earth and overheated picnickers, and - most relevant to global warming - they absorb CO2 while producing oxygen.

Lately, though, this accepted advantage of carbon sequestration by trees has come under attack from scientists who see a dark side to trees - at least in temperate and subarctic latitudes.

The U.S. Forest Service has begun a program where citizens can contribute 6 dollars to offset one ton of carbon dioxide through treeplanting programs in various U.S. locations. The program and its basic assumptions are under attack by some climatologists.

Not every scientist agrees that planting more trees in the United States will cut greenhouse emissions. Ken Caldeira, a climate expert at the Carnegie Institution at Stanford University, says restoring forests outside the tropics will do little or nothing to stop climate change.

Trees absorb more sunlight than the ground so they can add to warming, according to Caldeira. The effect rises when the ground is covered in snow, which reflects the sun's heat back into the atmosphere.

One thing we don't want is for people to be sold on taking actions that do little to change the trend toward climate change while offering them a feeling of complacency that, "Now I've done something to help. I can relax now."

More About Chinese Desertification

China's food security dilemma was touched on in a previous Climate Frog article, where a new policy was announced to set a bottom limit to the area of arable land in the country.

The Ministry of Forestry tells, on its Web site, that deserts cover 20% of China's territory, ranging from the upper reaches of the Yellow River, on the Qinghai-Tibet plateau and parts of Inner Mongolia and Gansu. In an article published on Planet Ark, a Ministry spokesperson describes the need to continue the huge effort China is making to stem the spread of these deserts.

This effort - consisting largely of mass tree planting campaigns - has become especially intense as the 2008 Olympics approach and China has committed to eliminating the chance that sandstorms (which have become increasingly common and widespread in recent years) will disrupt the event and embarrass the government.

"Experts say that the series of anti-desertification measures our country has taken has obtained obvious results, which have had an important effect on improving people's livelihood," it said.

"But at present the anti-desertification situation remains serious, and is still the main ecological problem which restricts our sustainable socio-economic development," the ministry added.

"Stepping up control efforts is of the utmost urgency."