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A persistent drought in China's Inner Mongolia is leaving herdsmen struggling to take care of their farmland and animals. 80 percent of the grasslands, which are essential to the livelihood of Mongolian herdsmen, are turning into desert.
A prolonged drought in Inner Mongolia is getting worse due to high temperatures. Herdsmen are struggling to irrigate their farmland with the desertification of the grasslands.
This herdsman grows corn as fodder for his cattle. He relies on a 26-foot-deep well for water supply. But he cannot pump enough out to irrigate his cornfield.
[Bilige, Herdsman]:
"My cornfield was watered only once this year. I usually take care of more than eight acres of cornfield, while this year, I could only manage three acres, due to the lack of water."
His flock of 100 sheep and 20 oxen will probably die from lack of fodder.
[Bilige, Herdsman]:
"I am terribly worried these days. As I have no money to buy fodder. My sheep are now in very poor condition, and they could not be sold at a good price when they are grown up. I have already borrowed 15-hundred U.S. dollars, and I might have to face another economic loss of 5,000 dollars."
Eighty percent of the 33 million acres of grassland in the region are showing signs of becoming a desert.
[Li Yunliang, Deputy Director of Hangjin Agricultural Bureau]:
"There is some green within 13 miles around the seat of Hangjin's government, owing mostly to a mild rainfall in some areas on June 14. The seedlings will dry out and die if no more rainfall comes in the near future."
The drought in China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region has affected more than four million acres of crops, with one and half million acres drying out.