YAN'AN, Shaanxi, Sept. 4 (Xinhua) -- Ma Zhibao is glad when he looks at the greenery in front of his house.
"It used to be a barren hill. Now, look how flourishing they are," says the 50-some-year-old, pointing at the trees that grew on the Loess Plateau.
Ma is a villager in Wuqi County, Yan'an City, known as the "red cradle" of the Chinese revolution before the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949.
The city, located in northwest China's Shaanxi Province, has been known to the world through the writings of Edgar Snow, an American journalist who came here in the 1930s and met with Mao Zedong, which he wrote about in his famous book "Red Star Over China".
However, for quite a long time the people of Wuqi County suffered from soil erosion due to the loose character of Loess, with its torrential rains in summer and over-cultivation by farmers.
Ma used to have nearly seven hectares of sloping land where he planted wheat, though the grain volume was meager.
"We only got 500 to 600 kg per hectare as the soil is not suitable for farming," he says.
The situation lasted until 1998 when Hao Biao, Party chief of Wuqi County at that time, decided to return farmland back to its original use as forest.
"We thought he was insane," says Bai Wenting, deputy Party chief of Wuqi County, who witnessed the change. "But he insisted on carrying out the decision despite doubts from everywhere."
One year later, China's former Premier, Zhu Rongji, visited Yan'an and called for the national implementation of an "re-afforestation policy". Wuqi then became a demonstration county for pioneering the policy, converting 104,000 hectares of sloping land to forest in 1999, and all at one time.
"Tree planting is much easier than farming," says Ma Deming, a villager in Wuqi's Mawan Village.
Now, he says youths are free to work downtown, as their parents are able to care for the maintenance of the trees, bringing more income for the family with various fruits.
He says his son is running a road transport business in the county. When asked how much his son could earn per year, he is reluctant to say anything but smile.
The villagers grow money-making trees, such as apricot and apple, which are easy to plant in that soil and are also profitable, Ma Deming says.
"We also have a government subsidy, about 1,000 yuan (146.9 U.S. dollars) per person every year," Ma says.
By 2009, Yan'an City had allocated more than six billion yuan as re-afforestation subsidies received from the central government over the past ten years, assisting more than one million farmers.
Working for the past ten years, the city has increased the forest (or grass) coverage by 15 percent, according to statistics from the Yan'an City Forestry Bureau.
Further, the State Forestry Administration (SFA) reports that more than 276 million hectares of farmland have been converted to forests in China, which could absorb one million tonnes of carbon dioxide once the trees turn into thriving forests.
China has spent more than 233 billion yuan on its re-afforestation policy, and forest coverage had increased by three percent throughout the country from 1999 to 2009.
The central government will spend an additional 200 billion yuan to continue with the policy, Wu Lijun, deputy director of afforestation of SFA , says.
