China makes arid Xinjiang a "national granary"

Chinese leaders are celebrating increased grain output in Xinjiang this year as part of their plan to boost the territory's role in national food security. 

According to official data released last week, Xinjiang's grain output grew 2.11 million metric tons (mmt) in 2024, Heilongjiang Province increased its output by 2.135 mmt, and Inner Mongolia increased its output 1.427 mmt. These 3 territories along China's northern fringe with broad swathes of grassland, desert, forest and swamps accounted for about half of this year's 11.1-mmt increase in national grain output.

MMT=million metric tons.

The political importance of the Xinjiang grain initiative is reflected by the number of articles in State media gushing over Xinjiang's grain targets and statistics. 

China's Xinhua News Service hailed the increase in Xinjiang's 2024 grain output this week, pointing to a record yield and the largest expansion of area planted of any province-level region. In October--two months before this year's data was released--Xinhua praised the Xinjiang Production Corps' record-setting grain yields, mechanization and technical expertise. 

In 2023 national leaders designated Xinjiang as a national reserve granary that will propel the plan to achieve another 50-million-ton increase in national grain output. Last year Xinjiang was ordered to plant 2.73 million hectares of grains. Official data indicate Xinjiang exceeded the target by 19 percent.  

In January 2024 State media led off the year by highlighting Xinjiang's contribution of one-third of the increase in 2023 grain output, lauding the filling of China's "food bowls" with "more Xinjiang grain." 

In February Xinjiang's agricultural work meeting increased the territory's target for grain output to no less than 22 mmt, demanding an increase in this year's grain output of 1 mmt. In May Xinjiang's deputy party secretary pledged to create China's "western granary" by boosting grain production 1 million metric tons. Official data released this month indicate Xinjiang again exceeded the target by producing 23.3 million metric tons. 

All Chinese officials were ordered to boost grain planting this year, and official data indicate that all but 5 of China's provinces reported increases in area planted in grain crops. Xinjiang beat them all by increasing its grain planting by 135,200 hectares in 2024, following up last year's increase of 390,200 hectares in its first year as a "national reserve granary." Jilin province was number 2 with an increase of 28,200 hectares this year and Inner Mongolia was number 3 with 27,100 hectares--both far behind Xinjiang's expansion. 

Source: Xinjiang and China Statistical Yearbooks.

Officials claim that most of the increase in Xinjiang's grain output came from improved yields. They cite high-standard field construction, mechanization, introducing high-yield varieties, dense planting of corn, building canals and facilities to move water from rivers and snow melt to fields, drip irrigation, spraying chemicals with drones and other techniques. However, Xinjiang's data looks dicey. The Xinjiang statistical bureau's site is several years out of date with no data since 2020. Is anyone watching? An earlier spike in Xinjiang's grain production from 2008 to 2015 looks questionable. 

China's State media published this photo of men filling a drone
apparently meant to spray on crops in Xinjiang.

As in the rest of the country, corn is the main grain crop in Xinjiang. Officials say the region's strategy is to maintain stable wheat production with an increasing proportion of strong gluten, selenium-rich and special use wheat, while expanding corn production with emphasis on corn for seed, silage, sweet corn and other special uses. 

According to a response to a question about this year's subsidies, a Xinjiang agricultural official said that growers of winter wheat would get a subsidy of 220 yuan per mu this year while the spring wheat subsidy was 115 yuan per mu (the subsidy had been 230 yuan in 2023). The official explained that Xinjiang uses the land fertility protection subsidy as a "baton" (presumably like an orchestra conductor) to "inspire and guide" farmers by setting differentiated subsidies for wheat, corn, silage, alfalfa and cash crops. The "one-time subsidy" was also distributed in this manner in 2022 and 2023. Subsidies for farm machinery purchases in Xinjiang were reported to be 1.37 billion yuan (over $200 million) in 2023. Grain production is also funded by transfer payments to major grain producing counties. 

In an earlier decade China moved nearly all the country's cotton production to Xinjiang to preserve "national cotton security," freeing up more land for grain in central and eastern provinces to maintain food security.  Now national food security policy dictates that Xinjiang produce more grain too. A Xinjiang official said the objective is to increase grain output while maintaining the region's cotton production at 5 mmt or more. Statistics for 2023 showed that cotton was the largest single crop in Xinjiang in terms of area planted (2.37 million hectares), followed by corn (1.437 mil. ha.) and wheat (1.21 mil ha).

Source: Xinjiang and China Statistical Yearbooks.

One of the problems with this plan is that Xinjiang is a long distance from China's population centers. Xinjiang's cotton already requires subsidies to transport to textile production centers on China's east coast by rail or truck, and grain would require a similar subsidy. The Xinjiang granary project includes construction of massive new warehouse capacity, so additional grain will likely be stockpiled and never actually consumed by humans. 

A major problem is Xinjiang's arid climate. The State Council's Development Research Center's initial assessment of the plan for making Xinjiang a "national granary" cited lack of water as one of the obstacles. Another official brushes off this issue by claiming that water can be moved around the region to irrigate the crops. The Xinjiang Production Corps claims to achieve high corn yields on desert land.

The Xinjiang project has similarities to a Soviet project in the 1960s that diverted two rivers in Central Asia to "make the desert bloom" by irrigating cotton, causing the Aral Sea to mostly dry up. The United Nations Development Program called this "the most staggering tragedy of the twentieth century." The U.S. "dust bowl" created by expanding crop area on the Great Plains a century ago also comes to mind. Is China producing a similar folly pushing crop production into environmentally fragile regions on its periphery where no one can see what's happening? Is anyone watching?

A water transfer canal in Xinjiang published by State media.