Fertilizers and pesticides are killing China's farmland

Want China Times, Staff Reporter 2014-07-01

A farmer lays fertilizer on a corn field in Heilongjiang province.
(File photo/Xinhua)

Heavy use of fertilizer and pesticides has helped China's northeast region become the country's top grain producer but at the cost of polluting the soil, which will take years to rectify, the Beijing-based Economic Observer reports.

The northeast, which includes the three provinces of Heilongjiang, Jilin and Liaoning, as well as the eastern part of the Inner Mongolia autonomous region, accounted for 24.1% of the country's grain production in 2013, with the northeastern most province of Heilongjiang the leading producer among them.

Local farmers told the paper that fertilizers have allowed them to double production and grow crops no matter how poor the soil is. One said fertilizers and pesticides are necessary because of the vast scale of their farms and the high cost of hiring workers to remove weeds.

However, Zhang Qingfeng, who runs a fertilizer wholesale business in Heilongjiang, predicted there may be no land suitable for cultivation in three or four generations since the heavy use of chemical fertilizers will lead to calcification of the soil.

Liu Hui, a research fellow at the Heilongjiang Academy of Agricultural Sciences, said the use of chemicals is on the rise across China and the problem is more serious in the southern part of the country because of higher temperatures and pest problems. These chemicals also enter the water used on the farms, creating further pollution, Liu added.

Moreover, southern China is also experiencing more serious heavy metal pollution because of the number of mines in the region, according to Liu.

At a forum in Qingdao in eastern China on June 5, Yao Jingyuan, an economist and special researcher for the State Council, said there have been too high expectations of bumper harvests over the past decade.

Yao said China uses four times as much fertilizer as the United States, three times that of India and that chemicals are the main reason behind the production surge, since the area of land used for farming is shrinking.

Liu said the problem is difficult to solve since it takes time to remove chemical pollutants from soils, and the shortage of grain in China makes it impossible to introduce crop rotation that would allow the land to recover.

Meanwhile, Zhang said farmers choose to use ammonia, which accounts for 95% of the fertilizer market, because of its lower price and that government intervention is needed to help turn the tide.

Liu added that the government should impose a ban on unsafe and toxic chemical fertilizers and pesticides, because farmers are unlikely to make the change of their own volition.