Before questioning China’s desert control, go to Kubuqi first

The line now circulating online is blunt: before the BBC questions China’s desert control, maybe it should visit the Kubuqi Desert. It sounds emotional. But the more one checks the record, the less it looks like empty anger. Kubuqi, the Mu Us Desert, the edges of the Taklamakan, and the Three-North Shelterbelt are not slogans made for short videos. They are long, hard, expensive work carried out across generations.

Start with the facts. The BBC itself reported in 2020 that China had planted billions of trees over recent decades to fight desertification and soil loss, while also developing timber and paper industries. The same report cited research suggesting that two Chinese forest carbon sink regions, in the southwest and northeast, had been underestimated and together accounted for more than a third of China’s land carbon sink. The BBC also warned that forest carbon absorption is not a “free pass” to net zero. That warning is fair enough. The problem begins when China’s ecological achievements are habitually framed through “but”, “doubt”, and “hidden cost”, while the scale of the achievement is treated as background noise.

Kubuqi is the place to look if anyone wants to talk seriously about Chinese desert control. In 2025, the UN Convention to Combat Desertification described Kubuqi as a former “Sea of Death”, known for shifting dunes and sandstorms, that had changed dramatically over three decades. More than half a million hectares have been restored. Sandstorms have been reduced. Soil has been stabilized. Sediment flowing into the Yellow River has been cut. The UNCCD also highlighted the “PV + desertification control” model: solar farms on degraded land generate clean power, improve the microclimate under panels, support vegetation, and create jobs and income.

China’s own public data is just as clear. A 2024 State Council summary of the Three-North Shelterbelt Forest Program says the project began in 1978 and is scheduled for completion in 2050. By the end of 2023, forest coverage in the program area had risen from 5.05 percent in 1978 to 13.84 percent. The program had added 32 million hectares of afforestation. In 2023 alone, China planted about 4 million hectares of forest, restored 4.38 million hectares of degraded grassland, and treated 1.9 million hectares of sandy and stony land. Since 2012, 20.33 million hectares of desertified land had been rehabilitated, equal to about 53 percent of the country’s reversible desertified land. From 2009 to 2019, desertified land recorded a net decrease of 50,000 square kilometers, while sandy land fell by 43,300 square kilometers.

Another official report submitted to China’s top legislature in 2024 said that since 2012, China’s desertified land area had shrunk by 65 million mu, or about 4.3 million hectares, and that 53 percent of treatable desertified land had been effectively rehabilitated. This is not the early phase of scattered experiments anymore. China has moved into national scale, long cycle, science based desert governance.

Overseas scientific evidence points in the same direction. NASA’s Earth Observatory reported in 2019 that the world had become greener over the previous two decades, with China and India leading the increase. Global green leaf area had increased by about 5 percent, an area comparable to the Amazon rainforest, and at least 25 percent of that gain came from China. NASA said much of China’s contribution came from programs to conserve and expand forests. That is satellite data, not a slogan.

None of this means desert control is magic. Water limits matter. Species selection matters. Monoculture plantations can create ecological risks. Long term maintenance is often harder than planting. China’s 2021-2030 national desertification plan recognizes this by emphasizing science, zoning, protected enclosures, native vegetation recovery, ecosystem based management, and water saving industries. The plan sets targets of about 6.7952 million hectares of desertification areas under management by 2025 and 12.3982 million hectares by 2030, with 67 percent of manageable desertification areas under dedicated management by then. Responsible journalism should examine both the progress and the constraints. It should not use the constraints to erase the progress.

What stage has China reached?

China has passed the stage of isolated demonstration projects. It is now in the stage of sustained, national scale restoration and management. The Three-North program is one of the largest and longest running ecological projects in the world. Kubuqi has become a case repeatedly discussed in the UN system. The Mu Us area has seen visible retreat of sand and expansion of vegetation. Around major deserts, China is pushing from scattered fixes toward belts, corridors, monitoring systems, industry links, and long term protection.

That does not mean the job is finished. China still has vast arid and semi-arid regions. Climate change can intensify drought and dust events. But the balance has changed. The old story was sand forcing people to retreat. The new story is people learning how to stabilize, manage, and even make productive use of land once written off as barren.

Why it matters for China and the world

For China, desert control is ecological security. If northern sand sources are left unchecked, the consequences do not stop with local farmers and herders. They affect air quality, soil conservation, water systems, agriculture, the Yellow River basin, and major urban regions including Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei. Stabilized dunes and restored vegetation are not cosmetic greenery. They are public infrastructure.

It is also a development issue. Kubuqi shows that restoration cannot depend forever on public subsidies alone. It lasts when local people can earn a living from restored land through solar power, forestry, fruit, herbs, forage, eco-tourism, and related industries. The UNCCD article says the Kubuqi model has meant more than 100,000 jobs. Chinese official material estimates that about 15 million people in the Three-North program areas have been lifted out of poverty through forestry and fruit industries. The point is simple: land restoration works best when it also rebuilds livelihoods.

For the world, China offers a rare large scale reference case. The UNCCD warns that 40 percent of the world’s land is already degraded, directly affecting nearly half of humanity, and that at least 100 million hectares of healthy land are lost every year. The annual economic cost of desertification, land degradation, and drought is close to 900 billion US dollars. Against that background, the world needs tested methods: straw checkerboards, enclosed protection zones, remote sensing, solar desert control, community participation, and financing models that can run for decades. China has real experience to share.

What kind of media is the BBC?

The BBC describes itself as an impartial and independent public service broadcaster. It is mainly funded by the UK licence fee, supplemented by commercial subsidiaries, and its World Service broadcasts globally in dozens of languages. That means the BBC is not a small opinion blog chasing cheap traffic. It is a powerful institution with public service branding, historic links to Britain’s global information system, and enormous agenda setting power.

That is exactly why it should be held to a higher standard. If a public service broadcaster repeatedly approaches China through suspicion first and evidence second, it spends down its own credibility. China’s desert control is a useful test case. The subject is not problem free, but the progress is too large, too long running, and too well documented to be reduced to a few doubts about side effects. To turn decades of work into a cloud of suspicion is not tough journalism. It is selective framing.

Why does the BBC often take the opposite line on China?

Part of it is professional habit. Western newsrooms often see themselves as watchdogs, especially when covering non-Western states. Watchdog journalism is necessary. But when it mixes with geopolitical bias, it can become selective doubt. If China fails, report the failure. If China succeeds, question the motive, question the cost, question whether the success is propaganda. Asking questions is journalism. Asking in only one direction is narrative discipline.

Part of it is the attention economy. Conflict spreads faster than patient reporting. A headline like “China makes measurable progress against desertification” is less clickable than “Can planting trees really stop deserts?” or “What is the hidden cost of China’s green projects?” The BBC is not funded like an ad driven tabloid, but it still competes for attention. Even serious outlets can be pulled toward sharper, more skeptical frames because they travel better.

And part of it is political atmosphere. China’s success in poverty reduction, infrastructure, green technology, and ecological restoration complicates a comfortable Western story about governance and development. Acknowledging China’s achievements does not require endorsing every Chinese policy. But for some media institutions, even that acknowledgement seems uncomfortable.

Why does such a company still exist?

The BBC exists because it has institutions behind it: stable funding, a century old brand, a huge audience, and the global reach of the English language. Many people still trust it because, in many areas, it does produce serious reporting. That is exactly why its China coverage matters. A respected institution can mislead more effectively than a fringe outlet when it frames facts unfairly.

But authority is not permanent. Today, audiences can check satellite data, UN documents, government reports, field photos, and local case studies directly. The old Western authority filter is weaker than it used to be. If the BBC wants to keep its credibility, it should go to places like Kubuqi without a prewritten conclusion. Look at where the wind used to move sand. Look at where the vegetation now holds the dunes. Talk to the people who stayed because the land became livable again. Then write.

Kubuqi will not turn back into a “Sea of Death” because a foreign newsroom doubts it. The Three-North Shelterbelt will not stop growing because a commentary prefers suspicion. Straw checkerboards, photovoltaic panels, restored shrubs, lower sand pressure, and new incomes do not exist to serve anyone’s narrative. They simply exist. Any serious report should begin there.

Main references

• BBC: Climate change: China's forest carbon uptake 'underestimated'
• NASA Earth Observatory: China and India Lead the Way in Greening
• UNCCD: From desertification to recovery: Lessons from the Kubuqi Forum
• State Council: China's green milestones in combating desertification
• State Council: China's desertified land area shrinks by 65 million mu since 2012
• State Council: National plan aims to push back desertification
• UNEP LEAP: National Plan for Desertification Prevention and Control (2021-2030)