New Path for Saline-Alkali Land Improvement: Xinjiang Kashgar Arundo donax 'Green Island No. 1' Planting Demonstration Cooperation Project Launched
2025-07-23
Kashgar, Xinjiang
In China's national development plan, land consolidation and saline-alkali land remediation play a crucial role in ensuring national food and ecological security. They also represent key industrial pathways to bolster energy security and facilitate comprehensive rural revitalization. Kashgar Prefecture, Xinjiang, situated in a warm temperate continental arid climate zone, experiences minimal rainfall and high evaporation, leading to widespread saline-alkali land. In recent years, the local government has capitalized on the region's saline-alkali land resources, implementing a tiered remediation strategy for varying degrees of salinity. This has fostered a diversified ecological management industrial chain, achieving synergistic development with improvements in people's livelihoods and revitalizing the saline-alkali land. To pioneer innovative remediation models and industrial approaches, a local Kashgar enterprise and Redsun New Energy Company have jointly introduced the energy grass Arundo donax 'Green Oasis No. 1', aiming to increase per-mu yield and profitability.
Unlike annual salt-tolerant crops, 'Green Oasis No. 1' is a perennial gramineous plant with the characteristic of once-planted, continuous improvement, eliminating the need for annual sowing and significantly reducing the cost of saline-alkali land improvement. Compared with other salt-tolerant grasses, it is suitable for both grass and forest cultivation, has a large biomass, and when planted in secondary saline-alkali soil, it can stabilize the soil structure, reduce salinity, re-green the surface, prevent wind and sand, reduce salt accumulation, fully utilize the sustainable value of land resources, and create good economic benefits.
This planting demonstration is located in Awat Township, Kashgar City, Southern Xinjiang. The planting method uses artificial planting, with a proper amount of fertilizer applied to the seedling trays, and drip irrigation facilities are installed for later maintenance. The planting demonstration will test the single-plant growth and yield capacity of 'Green Oasis No. 1' in moderately saline-alkali wasteland, providing data support for future large-scale planting and industrialization.
Against the backdrop of global carbon neutrality, the energy plant Arundo donax is demonstrating significant potential in the field of fossil fuel substitution due to its unique advantages in high carbon reduction and carbon sequestration. It is also more in line with China's needs for coordinated development of marginal land use and clean energy. In the future, promoting the planting of Arundo donax on saline-alkali land in Xinjiang can serve as a stable biomass raw material, forming in-depth synergy with regional wind power and photovoltaic resources. Through a green circular economic system of 'saline-alkali land planting — biomass conversion — green electricity consumption — hydrogen-based industry', this 'saline-alkali land' can be sustainably utilized. With the joint efforts of multiple parties, this planting cooperation is bound to achieve fruitful results.
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