Ms. Lan, known as Lan Jie, is an ordinary farmer from Yixingyuan Village, Wuchuan County. Like most ordinary farmers, she is hardworking and modest. Being open-minded, she became the representative of farmers in the new time. Confined by the under-development of local agriculture, Lan Jie found it hard to achieve greater development. With the launch of CIDA’s China-Canada Sustainable Agriculture Development Project (SADP) in 2005, a project office was established in Inner Mongolia AR (IMAR). Lan Jie’s farm became one of the pilot households of the project in Wuchuan, thanks to the efforts for the project office and the coordination of the local government.
 

Grounded through a review of the local facts and the assessment of the participatory needs, the SADP has several times invited famous experts from both Canada and China to give the farmers systematic training. Lan Jie almost always participated in the trainings in Wuchuan. She once said gratefully, “If you came several years earlier, we would have had broader vision and the technology level would be higher!”

The training has taught Lan Jie that protection of soil and reduction of wind erosion is a long-term and sustainable process. Yet considering that the local farmers are short of knowledge about it, leading persons are needed to test and demonstrate the new technology. As a vital part of sustainable agriculture, conservation agriculture is able to simultaneously protect the environment and enhance economic efficiency. Nevertheless, such challenges as inadequate equipment and weed control have to be taken into consideration. Before the start of the project, Lan Jie’s own fields, more than 30 mu, had been practicing reduced tillage, or no tillage with the assistance of the local agro-technology extension department. When there was not enough fodder however, local herds would flock into her no-tillage fields where crop residues were being retained over winter. The residue and stubble in the fields was devoured by them in no time. This made her no-tillage fields no different from the traditional ones. This resulted in undermining the role of crop residues in keeping moisture and raising soil fertility. By taking part in the training courses on conservation agriculture and doing fieldwork in Shanxi Province and other places, Lan Jie has realized that conservation agriculture is an integrated tillage system. The residue management should be strictly combined with farming techniques and crop rotation. The effective management of stubbles and residues is the key to successful conservation tillage.

This year just at the end of the harvest, Lan Jie not only retained a high stubble but she also enclosed the direct seeding area with no-tillage fields with help of the local government to protect the reserved crop stubble on the surface. She can’t help talking about the measures happily, “Thanks to the guidance of the government and the experts, I am now full of confidence that the income will be increased through no tillage to improve soil, control erosion and improve our living environment.”

Being a farmer for half of her life and a rural woman with only middle school education, Lan Jie has the courage to accept new ideas and to try new technologies. With the help of SADP, she has become enlightened and has applied her advanced knowledge to the actual production. She is full of confidence in the future and willing to transfer what she has learned to her fellow villagers. By doing so, she expects to improve their awareness of soil conservation, and environment protection and help them to be better farmers!