How to Reclaim Abandoned Farmland? This Is How to Bring Mountain Fields Back into Cultivation

It is easy to let a field go to waste, but hard to bring it back into cultivation. In recent years, with rural labor flowing out of many mountain areas, poor mountain farming conditions, and long-neglected irrigation facilities, some fields have been left abandoned for years on end. By the time migrant workers realize they want to farm again, it often takes several years to clear the weeds, repair the canals, and build up soil fertility. Reclaiming abandoned farmland tests not only your drive, but also your methods.

Step One of Reclamation: First Find Out the Field's "Background"

When you get a piece of land that has been abandoned for several years, do not rush to sow. First do three things: first, check how many years it has been abandoned; the longer it has been abandoned, the deeper the weeds and shrubs and the more severe the soil compaction. Second, check the water source conditions, whether the irrigation canals still flow and how well the mountain ponds hold water, since this determines whether you can grow rice. Third, check the access road to the field, whether farm machinery can get in. After finding out the situation, decide the planting direction: if water supply is not guaranteed, first plant drought-tolerant, easy-to-manage crops such as corn, sweet potato, beans, or forage grass, so the land can "come alive" first; after water and road conditions are restored, then consider returning to rice or higher-value cash crops.

Preparing the Soil and Building Fertility: Nurse the Land's Strength Back Bit by Bit

In reclaiming abandoned farmland, soil preparation is the biggest task. First cut and clear the weeds and shrubs, deep plow and sun the soil clods, turn the grass roots up to rot, and at the same time pick out stones and level the field surface. Where mountain plots are fragmented, you can take the opportunity to merge small fields into larger ones and change curved fields into straight ones, making future work with small farm machinery easier. In the first year or two, soil fertility is generally poor, so it is advisable to use more decomposed farmyard manure, return straw to the field, or plant a season of green manure such as Chinese milk vetch and plow it back into the soil, combined with soil testing and formula fertilization, so that soil organic matter slowly rises again. Never start by applying heavy chemical fertilizer in pursuit of high yields, as this easily burns the seedlings and damages the land.

Make Good Use of Policies So the Fields Have Someone to Farm Them for the Long Term

Bringing the fields back into cultivation is only the beginning; the key is having someone continue to farm them. You can take the initiative to learn about local support measures for reclaiming and recultivating abandoned farmland, grain planting, and farm machinery purchases. Subsidy standards and application procedures vary from place to place, so the latest information released by the local agriculture and rural affairs department and the farm machinery authority shall prevail. If you cannot farm the land yourself, you can, through land transfer, commissioned cultivation, joining cooperatives, and other methods, concentrate scattered plots for large growers or social service organizations to operate. At the same time, a reminder: after reclamation, you must keep farming year after year and combine use with care; once the land is abandoned again, the work of the previous years is wasted.

Farming is slow work. More than a thousand days of waiting in exchange for a stretch of lush green rice fields is worth it. As long as the methods are right and policies are fully used, turning wasteland into good farmland is not far away.