In the past years, through PPI/PPIC sponsored projects, soil scientists have selected an array of crops suitable for effectively combating soil erosion on sloping land in the southwestern Chinese provinces of Sichuan, Guizhou, Yunnan and Chongqing. These crops are usually cash crops that play dual roles - grown in alleys to block soil erosion and generating higher economic returns than grain crops for farmers. These crops can be divided into two categories: high canopy and low canopy.


The high canopy crops selected for this purpose are usually woody species, such as pear, plum, Chinese toon, tea, mulberry, prickly ash, etc., and low canopy ones are grassy species such as day lily, peanut, alfalfa, Chinese herbs, etc. In practice, either type of crop can be used alone or in combination to make the best match to produce maximum effect according to climate, land slope and market opportunities in the region. For example, the combination of pear tree + day lily is used in Jianyang county, Sichuan, mulberry + soybean in Santai county, Sichuan, Chinese herbs in Nanjiang county, Sichuan, prickly ash in Fuming county, Yunnan, Plum tree+polygonum cymosum Trev in Luodian county, Guizhou, and Chinese toon in Chongqing, etc.

As grain prices drop, farmers tend to reduce fertilizer input on grain crops and add them to more profitable cash crops such as those used in the alleys as hedgerow crops.

Some of the commonly used hedgerow crops are shown as below:

Pear tree + Day lily	Chinese toon	Plum tree+polygonum cymosum Trev	Chinese Prickly ash
Polygonum cymosum Trev	Vetivar	Eulaliopsis (a raw material for paper-making)	Gynura (a kind of wild vegetables)
Banana and pineapple	Chinese priskly ash + day lily	Chinese toon + day lily	Soybean

This technology has been transferred to counties in Sichuan, Chongqing，Yunnan and Guizhou in southwestern China. It can be expected that the technology will be spread to wider areas as more farmers and government officials see the environmental and economic benefits from this technology.