"Some of my colleagues criticized me for doing nothing 'scientific' with the grassland, they said it was unworthy of a scientist", said Jiang. Bayinhushuo Gacha's 72 households were also dubious. "The method sounded implausible to most of the villagers," recalled Gang Temoer, the 36-year-old village head.

    To everyone's astonishment, this "leave-it-alone" strategy paid off: in 2002, the grasses grew to a height of 1.43 meters and there was a record 79.5 tons of fresh grass per hectare.

    This was excellent news for the local herdsmen. Before the experiment, each household had to spend an average of 10,000 yuan (1300 U.S. dollars) to purchase forage-grass for their livestock during the winter. But in 2004, each family harvested 35,000 kilograms of grass on average, which became an important source ofincome.

    "I no longer have to drive the tractor hundreds of kilometers north through the snow searching for forage for our cattle and sheep. Standing in the high grass, I feel that I am back in touch with my lost childhood", smiled Wuritu. This year's sandstorms have been much less severe, even on days with force seven winds, he said. More convincing still, wolves are returning to the grassland, not to mention the re-emergence of roes, grey cranes and pheasants.

    "People say there is no 'science' in the project. But repairing the damage by doing nothing that contravenes natural rhythms is true to the philosophy of nature," observed Jiang.

    Conservation first, construction second

    The success achieved in Bayinhushuo Gacha quickly spread to the surrounding regions: several gachas followed suit, fencing off grasslands for natural restoration and thereby expanding the protected areas to more than 6500 hectares.

    The CAS program has triggered a series of changes in Bayinhushuo Gacha, both in terms of material wealth and in terms of the way people think. For instance, more than one third of the villagers now have access to electricity. Annual income per personrose from 2400 yuan (314 U.S. dollars) in 2000 to 2700 yuan (353 U.S. dollars) in 2004.

    Wuritu attributed the increased income to the upgraded breed of livestock. "After the grassland was fenced off, I cut down the number of cattle, but the milk output doubled because a new variety of cattle called Ximentaer was introduced. The mortality rate of livestock during the winter has also dropped because of the guaranteed supply of forage."

    In 2005, Wuritu spent 30,000 yuan (3920 U.S. dollars) on decorating his house and installed a central heating system. His eldest son has graduated from the Inner Mongolia Agriculture University -- an achievement unthinkable in the past. The university graduate recently presented his dad with a Motorola camera phone on which he can see the photos of his future daughter-in-law.

    "In the past, we used to joke that when night falls, herdsmen have no options other than sleeping and making babies. But now we are in contact with a world of research and new ideas, things unknown to us before," smiled Wuritu.

    With the help of the CAS and the government, Bayinhushuo Gacha has set up a company making traditional milk products, eco-tourism and has also started farming chickens whose impact on the land is less dramatic than cattle and sheep.

    Starting from this year, Jiang Gaoming plans to expand the program and turn Bayinhushuo Gacha into an ecological village based on biogas produced from cattle dung and re-processing of grasses.

    But what matters most to Jiang Gaoming is correcting the government's desertification control policies. "Ecology is on everyone's lips, but ecology does not mean blindly planting trees." Jiang is pleased that a policy of "ecological conservation first, ecological construction second" has been included in the 11th Five-Year Plan on Ecological Protection.

    He is happy that, from 2006, the 55.8 billion yuan (7.3 billion U.S. dollars) project for combating sandstorm sources around Beijing and Tianjin will include many other species of vegetation rather than exclusively focusing on trees.

    Jiang also hopes that the role of Inner Mongolia in the national economy will be reconsidered. "People traditionally regard Inner Mongolia as a livestock base. In fact, China's total grasslands of 400 million hectares provide only one fifth of the nation's animal husbandry products, but at a cost of serious environmental deterioration. A more intelligent geographic approach is needed."

    Coming from a village in East China's Shandong Province, Jiang Gaoming believes that science has its limits and mankind should co-exist with nature instead of arrogantly trying to impose his will on it.

    For instance, to feed the population, the Chinese government began intensively cultivating the land in northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region and northeast China's Heilongjiang Province in the 1950s.

    "Fifty years later, it is distressing to see that great swathes of the land that has been developed land is suffering from low water levels, removal of topsoil and the loss of wetlands, making it vulnerable to erosion and floods," said Jiang. "We have to learn the lessons and avoid these errors in the future."

    Jiang's ecologically-aware message has taken root in Bayinhushuo Gacha. "People of my generation have tasted enough bitterness from desertification and must save our descendants from a similar fate," beamed Wuritu, pointing to the tall grasses swaying softly in the wind.