Time to celebrate as dreaded white gives way to pure gold

“Fifteen years ago nothing would grow in this place other than sparse cotton with pitifully low yields,” says Li Dianquan, a farmer, as he busily refills a seeder.

- By ZHAO RUIXUE

Yet one day early last month on the very land Li is describing, in Dongying, Shandong province, seeders were moving up and down the fields planting wheat seeds. It was hard to imagine that in 2010 this vast expanse in Huanghekou town of Kenli district, was a stark, white expanse of saline-alkaline land.

Nestled on the shores of the Bohai Sea where the meandering Yellow River empties into the ocean, Dongying’s landscape has been shaped by an unusual geographical legacy.

The gradual retreat of seawater over time left behind salt deposits that have created 227330 hectares of saline-alkaline land.

“In the autumn harvest season Shandong's landscape resembles a colourful palette, but the last colour we want to see is the white of saline-alkaline land,” says Wang Jingdong, deputy director of the Shandong Provincial Department of Agriculture and Rural Affairs.