Growing millet in desert saves water and makes money.

On January 13, Lin Xinghui, party committee secretary of Menggen Taragacha Town, Barunbieli Town, Alashan Banner, Alashan League, Inner Mongolia, made a special trip to Beijing to see his own desert millet landing on the e-commerce platform Cofco I buy. "with sales channels, the purchase price of Xiaomi has risen to 4.2 yuan per jin this year." Lin Xinghui told the reporter with a smile that his face, which was reddened by the sun, was even more flushed at the moment.

In fact, Lin Xinghui has only planted millet in the last three or two years. In order to alleviate the growing desertification problem in Alashan region while ensuring the livelihood of local farmers and herdsmen, since 2009, the Alxa SEE Ecological Association has supported local farmers to plant millet with low water consumption to replace corn, wheat and other crops that have been planted in large quantities.

"We have only planted millet for sheep, but we have never planted millet for human consumption. At first, no one dared to plant it." Lin Xinghui, who was the first to grow water-saving millet in Menggen Taragacha, said that because he had cooperated with the association on the drip irrigation project under plastic film, he had the courage to plant five or six mu. "No matter how bad it is, it won't fail to harvest."

Although he did not understand the technology and had a modest harvest in the first year, Lin Xinghui found that "growing millet saves too much water." He made a comparison to the reporter: planting corn needs to be watered six times a season, and an mu of land is about 800 cubic meters; growing millet only needs to be watered three times a season, about 400 cubic meters.

In Alashan oasis, agricultural irrigation mainly depends on the extraction of groundwater from Helan Mountain. "the well has been drilled to 120 meters underground." Lin Xinghui said that although water costs no money, pumping water requires electricity, and the electricity charge for watering one mu of land is about 18 yuan.

In 2014, he not only planted all 70 mu of land in his family with water-saving millet, but also transferred 20 mu of land in the village. There was a great drought that year, but the average yield per mu of millet still reached 630 jin. "although the yield is not as high as that of corn between 1700 and 2000 jin, the unit price of millet is high, with a purchase price of 4.2 yuan per jin, which is four times that of corn." Lin Xinghui said: over the past year, 90 mu of land has earned nearly 230000 yuan, with an average income of 2600 yuan per mu.

The seed is Zhangzagu No. 5 introduced by SEE. The organic production operation rules are provided by SEE, and the sowing and harvesting are mechanized. There are too many millets planted, how to sell them? Through cooperation with enterprises, SEE pushes "Desert Millet" onto the e-commerce platform, processes it into ready-to-eat food, and explores a sustainable ecological protection chain.

Seeing that water-saving millet makes money and the marketing problem has been solved, the villagers are going to follow suit. "it is estimated that the planting area of Mengen Taragacha millet will exceed 1000 mu this spring sowing." Lin Xinghui himself plans to transfer another 60 mu of land.

The average water saving per mu is 400 cubic meters, and the average household income is 500 yuan. The exploration of "desert millet" has attracted the attention and support of the local government. Feng Yuzhen, head of the Alashan League, told reporters that if 30,000 mu of arable land in the Alashan Yaoba Oasis are planted with water-saving crops dominated by millet, the balance of groundwater exploitation and recharge in the entire oasis will be achieved. It is reported that Alashan League will cooperate with SEE to jointly promote 5000 mu of water-saving millet this year, and strive to expand the popularized area to more than 20 mu in the next 3-5 years.