From March 26 to 27, 2020, the church in Liangzhou District, Wuwei, Gansu Province, responded to the call of the local government and organized nearly 40 brothers and sisters to go to a desert in the eastern part of Liangzhou District to participate in the spring desertification protection work.
According to China Christian Council & Three-Self Patriotic Movement, the current windbreaks and efforts at controlling the sand focus on the construction of compressed sand barriers on the dunes. This is preparation work for future control of the desert and planned afforestation. The purpose is to stabilize the sand dunes and prevent the desert from encroaching and expanding further. Sand barriers are formed by compressing wheat straw husks on the shifting and barren sand dunes to form a 2-meter square wheat straw grid, covering the entire dune. The project is large and progress is slow. So far, there is no machinery that can be used to compress the sand so the work is totally dependent on manual labor.
In two days the volunteers from the church compressed a total of about 120 acres of wheat straw barriers, glorified God and helped people through their practical actions, while receiving praise from the local government and relevant departments.
- Translated by Abigail Wu
