Tibetannet

"During the Farmers' Harvest Festival, more than 1,000 mu (66.67 hectares) of artificial planted tall oat-grass were harvested, and each household was evenly allocated about 2,000 kilograms of that," said Tsering Dorje, the retired party secretary of the Jiaduo Village in Lhasa City, southwest China's Tibet.

The Jiaduo Village is a pastoral village where people mainly live on grazing animals. Before the artificial grass-planting project was implemented in 2012, the village completely relied on natural grassland for grazing, which brought about low livestock productivity and high mortality due to the lack of forage.

The project has not only satisfied the forage demand of livestock, but also improved the health condition of them, with almost no mortality. At the same time, some herdsmen even have surplus forage to sell out to increase income.

As a result, in addition to planting fresh grass in the field, villagers would also plant tall oat-grass, highland barley and other forage in their livestock pens in summer when livestock are transferred to meadow, so as to increase harvest in autumn.

"Growing fresh grass plays a good role in the short-term fattening of cattle and sheep," said Tsering Dorje. "After fattening, a yak can increase weight by about 25 kilograms, bringing in more than 1,500 yuan (218 US dollars) in income."　

"Everyone must improve their own literacy level and awareness of science needed by the development of modern animal husbandry," said Jampa Geleg, the party secretary of Jiaduo Village, who has not only been trained, but also went to pastoral areas in Gansu, Sichuan for learning and exchanging.