Email 
Print 
China's creeping sands, by Sean Gallagher, China Dialogue
Source: Pulitzer center
Reuters and AlertNet are not responsible for the content of this article or for any external internet sites. The views expressed are the author's alone.
Sean GallagherChina DialogueJune 25, 2009View this slideshow as it ran online at ChinaDialogue.net. Text and captions also available in Mandarin. Desertification is the gradual transformation of arable and habitable land into desert, normally caused by climate change or the destructive use of land. Each year, desertification and drought account for US$42 billion loss in food productivity worldwide.
It is estimated that nearly 20% of China's land area, some 1.74 million square kilometres, is now classified as desert. Affecting the lives of an estimated 400 million people, it is one of the most important environmental issues in China today.
Riding on China’s “desertification train”, which passes through the country’s driest and hardest-hit provinces – Inner Mongolia, Ningxia, Gansu and Xinjiang – Sean Gallagher travelled over4,000 kilometres to document the environmental challenges along the route.
You can read Sean Gallagher’s dispatches from the field here. Learn more about this reporting project.
