"Grassland State Forestry Project", usually called "Shelterbelt Project", is the largest project in American forestry history. Roosevelt presided over the decision, planning and implementation of this project from beginning to end. This large-scale grassland farmland shelterbelt project is also called "Roosevelt Shelterbelt Project" in China. More than half a century later, this once world-famous forestry project still has far-reaching influence in the forestry field of the United States.
Background of the formation and implementation of the project
When F.D. Roosevelt was elected president, it coincided with the severe depression of the American economy and thousands of people lost their jobs. At the same time, there are frequent fires in forests and natural parks, large areas of forests are in a barren state without management and protection, and sandstorms in the prairie are rampant, which makes people panic. After Roosevelt came to power, he began to carry out the "New Deal" and initiated the establishment of the "Folk Nature Conservation Corps" to attract a large number of unemployed young people in cities and towns to participate in fire prevention and fire fighting in forests and natural parks, and to carry out large-scale forest management and road construction.
On August 5, 1933, the US Forest Service reported that shelterbelts must be built to reduce the harm of sandstorms. The outline of the forest belt envisaged this time is: from the Canadian border to the Gulf of Mexico, it is 2300 kilometers long and 32 1.8 kilometers wide; The forest belt consists of several forest belts, each with a width of 30.48 meters, including 10 to 20 rows of trees; The distance between forest belts shall not be less than 1.6 km. It is to tie a shelterbelt in the middle of the continental United States to block the dry wind from the west.
At that time, the views of the president and experts were different. After several discussions, experts adopted a more flexible attitude to reduce costs. However, from the autumn of 1933 to the spring of 1934, some serious events occurred in the United States: bankrupts from grassland states poured into states and cities with better economic conditions, which caused widespread social unrest and panic and accelerated the birth of the project plan.
On May 28th, 1934, experts once again suggested shortening the original shelterbelt and extending it from Bismarck, North Dakota to the south of Amarillo, Texas. In six states covered by forest belt, two nurseries will be built in each state. It is estimated that 700 million seedlings will emerge in 10, seed collection will begin in 1934, seedling raising will begin in 1935, and large-scale afforestation will begin in 1937.
On July 1934, 1 1 day, Roosevelt issued an order announcing the birth of the grassland state shelter forest project, and asked Congress to allocate 75 million dollars as the project cost. These funds are used for seed collection, seedling raising, land negotiation, tree planting, replanting, fence construction, prevention of pika harm, forest belt management, scientific research, public relations, equipment supply, labor arrangement and organization, etc.
19341June 10, the Ministry of Agriculture organized various technicians and experts to investigate and verify the geographical scope of the forest belt. The scope they finally approved is: starting from the northern border of North Dakota in the north, extending south along 99 degrees west longitude, turning west to the border between Kansas and Oklahoma, and then traveling south along 100 degrees west longitude to the north of Abilene, Texas, with a total length of 1850 kilometers and a width of 160.9 kilometers. This range is located between the eastern high grassland and the western low grassland, and it is the westernmost area where forests grow. Further west, trees will not grow easily, nor will they become forests. If the mountain range is located to the east, the protection benefit of the forest belt will be reduced.
Why is there no stamina for engineering construction?
The area of Roosevelt shelter forest initially accounted for less than 65438 0% of the total farmland area. After 1942, until the 1970s, although some shelterbelts were still built on grasslands every year, the scale was reduced year by year.
An official of the US Forest Service wrote that 90% of the farmland in the prairie still needs shelter forest protection. The average annual rainfall of many farms and pastures is less than 15 inch. Although shelterbelts are more needed, afforestation is extremely difficult to succeed.
Afforestation is divided into regeneration afforestation, restoration afforestation and wasteland afforestation. Grassland farmland shelterbelt afforestation is mainly in forestless land, that is, afforestation in forestless land. /kloc-in the middle of the 0/9th century, the afforestation experiment of American grassland began from the day when grassland immigrants concentrated. 1873, the U.S. Congress promulgated the Timber Culture Act to encourage afforestation in the western grasslands, aiming at improving the climate and cultivating timber supply. According to this law, anyone who planted 16 hectares of grassland and made the trees grow healthily for 10 years can get 64 hectares of land for free. However, because the western prairie is not suitable for afforestation, climatic conditions, fires, pests, human fraud and so on have led to a complete failure of afforestation. Few people get land and really build forests!
The shelter forest swayed in the wind and rain.
When the United States was founded, the population was concentrated in 13 states on the east coast of the Atlantic Ocean. However, after the middle of the19th century, the population of grassland areas in the central and western regions increased significantly. Intensive grazing and uncontrolled reclamation led to the destruction of grassland ecosystem. With improper grazing and reclamation, grassland vegetation has disappeared and sandstorms have become more frequent.
The Roosevelt Shelterbelt Project officially started in the spring of 1935. At the end of the planting season of 1942, * * * planted more than 200 million trees and shrubs, which were distributed in more than 30,000 farms in six grassland states from the Canadian border in the north to the Gulf of Mexico in the south. Nearly 30 thousand square kilometers of afforestation in 8 years, almost all of which were planted on private agricultural land.
The United States Forest Service organizes and implements shelter forest projects, with shelter forest engineering offices in six states: North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas, and an engineering office in Lincoln, Nebraska. The first task completed by the forestry department, which is also the most commendable, is to ensure the supply of seedlings.
The general survey of 1944 Roosevelt Shelterbelt Project shows that although about 10% of afforestation has disappeared or suffered from severe grazing, more than 80% of them are considered to have played an effective or better role. After 10 years, when it was investigated again in 1954, it was still considered to have played an effective or better role, and it fell to 42%. Drought, pests and diseases and improper grazing have sounded the death knell for large-scale shelterbelts. However, most of the carefully constructed shelterbelts have played the role of planning hope.
However, in the 1960s and 1970s, some farms destroyed many shelterbelts in order to expand cultivated land and build a central sprinkler irrigation system. 1975, when the national auditor testified in Congress, he pointed out: "Unless immediate measures are taken to encourage farmers to renew and protect forest belts, the forests we have built for many years will disappear, the nearby farmland will be blown by the wind again, and the fertility will decline rapidly." American Forestry Journal 1990 65438+ 10 lamented: "Forest belts are dying!" A person who has been engaged in technical work at the grass-roots level for a long time pointed out that the grassland windbreak belt is a pioneering work of mankind in forestry, but now it may be the dying part of the grain-producing prairie in the United States. It is puzzling that even some people in the Ministry of Agriculture want to get rid of farmland shelterbelts, because shelterbelts consume a lot of water and occupy many fertile farmland.
Roosevelt shelterbelt project has once again become the focus of attention.
Sorry, I can't find any information about Stalin's plan to improve nature.