So where did the Yellow River become a "hanging river"?
In Dengkou County, southwest of Bayannur League in Inner Mongolia, Zhang Shaofu, secretary of the county party committee, said: Start from Dengkou. The Yellow River here is 4 to 6 meters higher than the county seat on average.
Dengkou was called "Three Gong Sheng" before the founding of the People's Republic of China with a long history. When Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty established Shuofang County, it was under the jurisdiction of 10 County, and the ancient city sites of three counties were all in Dengkou. According to historical records, this place was rich in water and grass in the Han Dynasty. During the Southern and Northern Dynasties, due to large-scale reclamation and excessive logging, the original vegetation was destroyed and the surface was exposed. In addition, the Yellow River changed its course many times, and tertiary sediments were impacted. Under the action of the wind, barren sand was blown up and piled up, forming Wulanbuhe Desert. Historically, quicksand once buried three old cities, forcing the Yellow River to change its course three times. A large amount of quicksand is injected into the Yellow River, and the downstream suffers greatly. In the Qing Dynasty, horses and chariots could only walk along the banks of the Yellow River. When People's Republic of China (PRC) was founded, there were only 20,000 people in Dengkou, less than the Han Dynasty.
Dengkou is the beneficiary of ecological construction. After the founding of New China, after the huge greening project of154km was completed, the violent sandstorm stopped and agricultural production increased year after year. Whenever there is a drought in the pastoral area, the sheep are driven to the forest belt to graze and tide over the difficulties. It belongs to a typical continental monsoon climate with sufficient light and heat, and is one of the regions rich in light energy resources in China. The temperature difference between day and night is large, which is 14℃ ~ 20℃ from April to September, which is very suitable for the accumulation of dry matter and sugar in various crops. As long as the fruits and vegetables are planted, they are all high-quality products.
So once the ecological environment is destroyed, the trouble of Dengkou begins. During the Cultural Revolution, due to the neglect of planting grass to seal sand, the forested area in the county decreased sharply from 80,000 mu to 30,000 mu, dozens of gaps appeared in the sand-prevention forest belt, the width of the forest belt without gaps was reduced, and the vegetation was destroyed. The forest coverage rate of the county is only 4.39%, which is less than the national 1/4. The soil erosion area is 3 182 square kilometers, and it is still expanding at the rate of 20 square kilometers per year. Salinized land accounts for 67% of cultivated land, and the cultivated land threatened by severe salinization accounts for 13.7% of the total cultivated land area.
Dengkou is located in the tuyere zone between Helan Mountain and Langshan Mountain, with sandstorm line150km. Wulanbu Desert expands eastward to 10 meter at a speed of 8 meters every year, and the Yellow River flows through Dengkou County for 52 kilometers. The Wulanbu Desert is 20 kilometers away from the Yellow River, and it transports 60 million tons of sand to the Yellow River every year, accounting for 60% of the total sediment concentration of the Yellow River.
Due to the continuous eastward movement of Wulanbuhe Desert, it directly threatens the safe operation of the county's15,000 mu of cultivated land and baotou-lanzhou railway and 1 10 national highways, and threatens the normal operation of the whole Bayannaoer League main canal. Shililiuzi sluice was forced to be abandoned, and the diversion channel was buried by quicksand. Each channel in rural areas needs to spend more than 3 million yuan every year to dredge it. Due to the elevation of the Yellow River bed, the 20-kilometer main channel in Dukou Township, Niuxia, three sheng Public Water Conservancy Project oscillated, resulting in bank collapse and destroying nearly 10,000 mu of farmland and forest land. 1993 In the spring, due to repeated sandstorms, the sediment discharge increased, which led to the breach of the river bank in Nantaozi section in winter, forming an 80-square-kilometer floodplain of the Yellow River, with economic losses reaching 35 million yuan.
Happily, this situation is expected to change now. 1998, Dengkou was listed as a national key county for ecological construction. Taking this opportunity, Dengkou County Party Committee and government decided to mobilize the whole people, work hard, organize and coordinate the forces from all walks of life, accelerate the pace of ecological environment construction, and strive to build ecological civilization.
Dengkou put forward a series of innovative policies and measures, such as: adhering to the principle of who invests, who builds, who operates and who benefits, allowing multiple forms of ownership and multiple modes of operation to coexist; Allow ecological resources and technical resources to enter the market; It is allowed to break industry boundaries and different economic entities purchase the right to use the "five shortages"; Allow the economic entities that purchase the right to use to operate the "five barren" land in various forms such as joint-stock system and joint-stock cooperative system; Allow the right to use the "five shortages" to remain unchanged for more than 50 years; The fruits of governance and development can be inherited and transferred. At the same time, in 10 year, the new income of planting and aquaculture for mountain control and sand prevention will be exempted from agricultural specialty tax, and the production of seedlings in state-owned forest farms and nurseries will be exempted from agricultural specialty tax. Eco-environmental projects invested and constructed by the state and local governments shall be constructed in a unified way, managed at different levels and contracted with compensation.
This policy of encouraging domestic and foreign investors to participate in ecological construction has achieved good results. Up to now, 35 households in the introduction area of the county have invested in the management and development of Ulan Buh Desert, and managed and developed 80,000 mu. With the strong support of the United Front Work Department of the Central Committee, the State Ethnic Affairs Commission, the Ministry of Land and Resources and the State Forestry Administration, we are also actively cooperating with "Glorious Cause" Land Greening and Consolidation Co., Ltd., preparing to vigorously carry out ecological environment management along the Yellow River, and are currently actively negotiating specific plans.
Dengkou also submitted three ecological projects to the state for support:
1. Dengkou County 154 km windbreak belt was built in 1950s and is an important part of the "Three North" shelterbelt system. For more than 40 years, this forest belt has played a great role in prevention and protection. However, due to the fact that most trees have reached or exceeded the mature stage, combined with diseases and insect pests, human and animal damage and other reasons, the residual forest has increased year by year, and the overall protection function has seriously declined. There are 165 gaps with a total length of 7 1.3 km. The quicksand, which was basically repaired, was activated again. Quicksand invades eastward at a rate of 5 to 7 meters per year. Every year, nearly 1000 mu of farmland is occupied and buried, and tens of millions of tons of sediment are transported to the Yellow River. The storage capacity of public water conservancy projects in three sheng suffered heavy losses, and the 1 10 national highway and baotou-lanzhou railway were once again threatened by sandstorms. Due to the financial difficulties of Dengkou, there is no remedy. It is hoped that the country will include the reconstruction project of this forest belt in the fourth phase of the "Three North" shelterbelt project as soon as possible. What the reporter saw with his own eyes was a large area of dead trees and treetops in the forest belt, which was shocking.
Second, the Yellow River flows through Dengkou for 52 kilometers, of which 8.5 kilometers from Shililiuzi to Liuguashantou is the most serious hazard, which seriously threatens the safety of the Yellow River and the production and life of people along the coast. It is suggested that the state should incorporate Dengkou into the soil and water conservation project in the middle and upper reaches of the Yellow River as soon as possible.
Third, there are nearly 300,000 mu of rare and endangered plants such as ammopiptanthus mongolicus, Nitraria tangutorum and Mongolian almond in Dengkou County. For a long time, without special funds and protection, it was destroyed by people and animals, and the wind erosion was very serious, especially Ammopiptanthus mongolicus, which belongs to the ancient desert remnant species and is the only evergreen shrub in this area. Dengkou requested to establish an endangered species Ammopiptanthus mongolicus reserve in this county.