Forest's decay boosts risk of sandstorms(2)

In addition, the barren soil cut the ways of making money from planting commercial plants like fungus, and the dried trees made the trunk worthless.

"We have to sell saplings and rent houses surrounding our farms," said Liu Zhisheng, director of the Central Forest Farm.

The farm's total annual income is about 700,000 yuan ($115,000).

"It barely covers salaries for our 25 workers, who patrol the farms every day to guard against felling and fires," he said.

"There is little money from the farm to build ditches to water the forest or other necessary construction, so the trees live at the mercy of the elements."

There are four ways of reforestation, of which clear cutting is the first choice for the protective forest in Zhangjiakou.

"More than half of the trees are dead, making the woodland lose the ability of self-renewal, thus other methods involving planting new trees from the living branches are not applicable," said Zhao Shunwang, deputy director in charge of updating programs.

About 667 hectares of dead forest had been replanted by May in Mantouying township, and these saplings can grow into trees to catch blowing sand in four to five years.

"But it's not fast enough to reforest all the decaying and protect the downwind cities," he said. "More important, we cannot afford the large investment into this program."

The average investment was 19,950 yuan per hectare in the pilot program of Mantouying.

The four counties of Bashang, including Zhangbei, are not well-off and lack the means to allocate millions of yuan to reforestation.

Authorities in Hebei and Zhangjiakou have jointly handed in a feasibility study on updating the hypermature forest in Bashang, saying 558 million yuan will be allocated to update the dead poplars of the 33,800 hectares.

They have applied for approval from the central government.

"The lack of allocation in tending forest exists in many shelterbelt programs in Hebei," said Zhao Yanbin, an expert with the forestry bureau in nearby Shijiazhuang.

He said his research had shown many programs in other cities faced similar difficulties.

"For the deteriorating air quality, it's urgent to guarantee the forest works well, and to that goal the country needs to file policies to encourage the public to participate into the protection," he added.