0049-A2

Role of Chinese Moso Bamboo in a Township in China

Rongsheng Li ¹, Guangtian Yin ¹, Huangcan Xu ¹, Zhongjie Shi ², Jinchang Yang ¹

Abstract:

Moso bamboo, Phyllostachys heterocycla var. pubescens, grows so widely in Guilin Township, Shaowu, Fujian, China that was chosen as the key to alleviate the poor of the local residents and enhance the revenue of the local government by the government. The first step the government took was to assess the role of the bamboo in the life of the local residents. An investigation on the area of moso bamboo plantation each household owned and a questionnaire survey on the role of bamboo in the life of Guilin Township residents were carried out in the summer of 1999 and 2002 respectively. The results showed that most households owned more or less moso bamboo plantations; moso was used as construct materials, firewood, and foods and processed into dried bamboo shoot. The ratio of bamboo income to the whole income of most households varied from 0 to 70 percent. The income of bamboo mainly sourced from dried bamboo shoot and was used to pay for daily life need items such as edible oil, salt, and clothes to high-level life need items like televisions, motorcycles, and washing machines etc., the income was also used to pay tuitions for children and deposited in banks for big events such as marriages and house-buildings in the future. Most households didn't want to give up moso bamboo plantations or replace them by other plants. It was concluded from above that moso bamboo really played an important role in the life of local residents in Guilin Township.

Introduction

Guilin Township, of which about 90 percent is mountainous, is a remote township located in the north of Fujian Province. For its remote, mountains and thus poor transportation, Guilin Township has a poor industry and is undeveloped. Most people of Guilin Township are poor and live a hard life. Realizing the situation, the local government of Guilin Township tries to do its best to alleviate the poor of its people and enhance its revenue. Moso bamboo, Phyllostachys heterocycla var. pubescens, a fast-growing, high-value, multi-purpose bamboo species, is chosen as the key to reach the objectives of the local government, because more than 6000 hectares, about 38 percent of the land of Guilin Township, are planted with moso bamboo according to the Inventory of National Forest Resource. In the past, the tax a household paid was determined by the volume of dried bamboo shoot the household produced, i.e., the more the dried bamboo shoots a household produce, the more tax it should pay. Thus, most households didn't put much attention in the management of bamboo plantations and got the similar income, and consequently the productivity of bamboo plantations was decreasing which reduced the production of bamboo shoot. Then, the local government decided that the tax a household paid should be determined by the area of bamboo plantations the household had, then, the more attention a household put into the management of the bamboo plantations, the more income it would obtain. The first step the local government took was to assess the area of bamboo plantation each household had and the role of moso bamboo in the life of its local residents, which is presented in this paper. The results can be compared with the same investigation in the future to assess the changes the actions the local government took made on local community and because there are many townships around Guilin Township with a similar situation, the results in the paper is meaningful for them too.

Materials and Methods

Description of Guilin Township

Guilin Township is located at the southwest of Shaowu district, surrounded by Shaowu, Lichuan, Taining and Jianning counties (Figure. 1). The mean elevation is 720 meters, with the highest being 1416 meters, the lowest being 486 meters. There were 3156 families, with a total population of 11836 when the investigation was carried out. The Local Government of Guilin Township provided the data on the number of people and the production of dried bamboo shoots of each household.

Figure 1. The location of Guilin Township

Measurement of area

During 8-28 July 1999, 18 senior students from Fujian Forestry College (now School of Forestry, Forestry and Agricultural University) carried out the investigation on the holding size of moso bamboo for each household in Guilin Township, with guide provided by the cadres of the village and township and the owners of the land. The area is calculated by the formula of Area=Area of Slope×cos(Slope Degree). The area of slope was obtained by measuring two vertical crossed middle lines depending on the shape of the land. The length is measured by tape and slope by Blume-Leiss altimeter.

Figure 2. The villages being investigated

Movement of dried bamboo shoot from plantation to market

Information on the movement of dried bamboo shoot from plantation to market was collected by talking with different people from farmers and middlemen to cadres of village and township.

Questionnaire survey

In July, 2002, five senior student from the School of Forestry, Fujian Agricultural and Forestry University went to Guilin Township to do a face-to-face questionnaire survey. A structured questionnaire with explaining the purpose of the survey and guaranteed the respondents full anonymity to the interviewer was compiled before the questionnaire survey carried out. Nine villages with 375 households were involved in the questionnaire survey, the location of surveyed villages is dotted out in the Figure 2. The villages are on diagonal of Guilin Township, however, there was not any village chosen in the western Guilin for the road for vehicle is destroyed when the questionnaire survey went on. It was requested that every household in the nine villages was not missed. However, Village Jiaoxi was exception for some 19 households were absent. The number of households in each village is listed in table 1. In sure to make an interview smoothly, the students explained the purpose of the survey and guaranteed the respondents full anonymity to the interviewer at the beginning of every interview.

Table 1. The villages and their households investigated.

Results

Number of people in each family

The data on the number of people in family were sorted into table 2. The number of people per family varied from 1 to 9, with most families having 3 to 5 people. In addition, the questionnaire showed the population of all nine villages surveyed was 1595, including 1191 adults and 403 children, i.e. more than 25 percent of the whole population are children who cannot be considered labors. That is to say that most households didn't have enough labors and would consequently have to hire outside labor to assist in harvesting bamboo shoots during peak production period.

Table 2. The number of people in each family.

Area of moso bamboo plantation each household had

The investigation in 1999 showed that among 3156 families, there are 2803 households owned moso bamboo plantations. Area of this bamboo plantation varied from 0 to 32 hectares per household. A total of 1901 families or 68% of the plantation owners had only less than 2 hectares. The number of households owning 6-7 hectares decreased drastically to only 33. Three to five households had 12-18 hectares of plantation each. Only one household owned 18-32 hectares of bamboo plantation (Table 3). In other words, the larger the area of plantation is, the lower the number of households owning them.

Table 3. The area of moso bamboo plantation each household had.

Production of dried bamboo shoots of each household

The data of the production of dried bamboo shoots of each household provided by the Department of Revenue of the local government of Guilin Township were sorted into table 4, including those for the year 1998 and 1999. According to the questionnaire survey, among 375 households surveyed, 355 households produced dried bamboo shoots. Bamboo shoots were stored in a wooden warehouse built at the border of moso bamboo plantations after being boiled. Every year, tax collectors determined the amount of tax each household should pay by measuring the volume of bamboo shoots when they were still in warehouse. The volume of dried bamboo shoots each household produced ranged from 0 to 9.5 cubic meter in 1998, and 0 to 8.0 cube meters in 1999. Table 4 shows that the number of the households which had less than 1.0 cube meter of dried bamboo shoots in 1998 was less than that in 1999.

Table 4. Production of dried bamboo shoots of household.

More households had more than 1.0 cubic meter of dried bamboo shoots in 1998 than in 1999. The largest volume of 9.0-9.5 cubic meters was produced in 1998. It means that the year 1998 was the `on' year; while the year 1999 was the `off' year for shoot production. In the `on' year, most households had more production of dried bamboo shoots, resulting in decreasing the number of households having small volume of dried bamboo shoots and increasing the number of households having large volume of dried bamboo shoots.

Flow of dried bamboo shoot from plantations to consumers

Through interview and discussion with local farmers, middlemen and cadres of village and township, information on the production and marketing of dried bamboo shoots was obtained (Fig. 3). Moso bamboo plantations provide three kinds of raw materials: culms, bamboo shoots, leaves and branches. The growers in Guilin Township harvested bamboo shoots from

Plantations of P. heterocycla var. pubescens

Culms
Bamboo Shoot
Leaf and Branch

Boiled

Stored in Warehouse, Given a High Pressure from the Top

Volume Measured for Tax

Dumped out and Sun-dried

Sold to Middlemen
Transported to the Market of Shaihai, Zhejian, Jiansu

Sold to Consumers

Figure 3. The flow of dried bamboo shoots from plantations to consumers

winter to the next spring. After being dig out, the shoots are boiled with water until they become edible. They are then stored in wooden drums. On top of the shoots stored in the drums, high pressure was exerted by using a large piece of stone or by a wood leverage. After several months, the tax collectors or cadres of village and township will measure the volume of bamboo shoots in every warehouse for tax assessment. The owners paid tax according to the assessment. The tax per cubic meter was around 600 Yuan. Then from summer to autumn, the bamboo shoots in the warehouse would be taken out and dried under sunlight. Finally, the dried bamboo shoots were sold to middlemen and transported to Shanghai, Zhejian and Jiansu for sale. Prices of dried bamboo shoots per cube meter range from 4000 to 8000 Yuan, depending on the quality class of dried bamboo shoot.

Use of moso bamboo

According to the questionnaire survey, among 375 households interviewed, there are 355 households producing dried bamboo shoot using bamboo shoots, 199 households eating fresh and dried bamboo shoot, 72 households using bamboo as weaving material, 24 households using bamboo as construct material, and only 20 households using bamboo as firewood. Therefore, being processed into dried bamboo shoot is the most important use of bamboo in Guilin, followed by food, and weaving. However, it is surprising that there are not many households in Guilin using bamboo as firewood. This may be due to too many shoots processed into dried bamboo shoot. Compared with the documented 1500 uses for bamboo(Rao & Sastry 1998), the use of moso bamboo in Guilin is limited, however, it is similar to the other bamboo species such as Schizostachyum brachycladum(Susiarti and Soedjito 1996) in local community. The use of bamboo is extended with the science and technology developing, therefore, the limited use of bamboo in Guilin Township is partly due to the underdevelopment of science and technology.

Income generated from moso bamboo

In the questionnaire survey, the income a household obtained in a year was divided into the comes of bamboos, fruit trees, other forest products, crops, culturing, business, casual labours and others. In the case of bamboo income, it was divided into the incomes of fresh bamboo shoot, dried bamboo shoot, and culms. Then the percent of the income of bamboo in the total income of a household was calculated and sorted into table 5, the percent of fresh bamboo shoot, dried bamboo shoot and culms in the total income of bamboo were calculated by dividing the sum of those bamboo products by the sum of the total income of bamboo. It can be learned from table 5 that the percent of bamboo income in the total income of a household could reach as high as 90 above and as low as 0. The percent of bamboo income in the total income of most households is below 70. According to the survey, the income generated from dried bamboo shoot is the most important source of the income of bamboo, occupying 40.9 percent of the income of bamboo. The income of culms follows the fresh bamboo shoot, occupying 33.5 percent of the income of bamboo, followed by fresh bamboo shoot, 25.6 percent of the income of bamboo. According to the survey, among 375 households surveyed, there are 375 households buying daily life items such as salt, edible oil, rice and so on by the income of bamboo, 355 households paying tax especially agricultural tax, 352 households paying tuition for children and 296 households buying alcohol and cigars, however, there are only 112 households paying travel costs, 79 households buying expensive items like televisions, washing machines, refrigerators, videos, and motors, 49 households depositing the income of bamboo for marriage wedding and house-building in the future, 36 households using the income of bamboo as business-started capital. Therefore, it is concluded that the income of bamboo is used in many ways, the most common use is to buy daily life items such as salt, oil, rice, alcohol and cigars, and to pay tax and educational costs such as tuition. The other less common use of bamboo income included buying higher items such as television, washing machines, and motorcycle, travel costs, business-starting capitals. According to the survey, there are 197 households considering bamboo income very important, 166 households considering bamboo income not very important, 12 households considering bamboo income not important. Therefore, on the question of what would you do with bamboo plantations, among 375 households surveyed, there are only 7 households would give up bamboo plantations, however, there are 304 households would continue to run bamboo plantations, and 62 households expanding bamboo plantations, and not any household would like to replace bamboo with other species or crops.

Table 5. The percent of bamboo income in the total income a household obtained in a year.

Conlusion and Discussion

It is concluded from above, most households in Guilin Township had some plantations of moso bamboo, the bamboo was processed into dried bamboo shoot, used as firewood, constructing and weaving materials, fresh bamboo shoots can be eaten. Bamboo income was part of the whole income of most households, it mainly sourced from dried bamboo shoot and was used to pay many items including daily life needs to expensive products. Bamboo income was considered important or very important among most households. Most households would keep running bamboo plantations. Therefore, it can be learned that moso bamboo played an important role in the life of people of Guilin Township.

To date, however, the contribution of this bamboo species to the life of people of Guilin is being questioned. With more people leaving the hometown to work and bringing what their income back, the percent of bamboo income in the whole income of household is decreasing. According to the movement of bamboo shoot from plantation to market, the income of people in Guilin depends too much on the consumers in Shanghai, Zhejian and Jiansu. If the consumption of dried bamboo shoot is reduced in Shainghai, Zhejian and Jiansu, the income of people in Guilin is also reduced. Therefore, the system that supports local people in Guilin is vulnerable.

Although moso bamboo provides culms, bamboo shoot, and leaf and branch, only bamboo shoots were utilized. Even processing of bamboo shoots is a monopoly. Therefore it is advisable to diversify the utilization of P. heterocycla var. pubescens, such as using culms to make furniture or pulp and roots to make handicrafts besides bamboo shoot utilization. Even for fresh bamboo shoots, they can be canned.

The other problem is that there is a lack of knowledge of moso bamboo plantation management and capital in Guilin. The diameter of culms in most plantations of moso bamboo is rather small. This is caused by intensive harvesting of bamboo shoot. Since Guilin Township is a remote mountainous region, not only outsiders are not likely to work in Guilin, but also those Guilin people who are educated. Lack of trained people deters the development of Guilin Township even it has a large volume of bamboo resource. There is not any manufacturing factory to process bamboo because of lack of capital.

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank Mr. Tan Ching Feaw, Malaysia for editing the article, the Local People's Government of Guilin Township for providing the local cadres to organize farmers to carry out the investigation and providing the data of the population, the production of dried bamboo shoots of individual family and accommodation during the investigation. We are also indebted to Professor Yichi Liang and Jinyi Lin, Master student Heming Chen, the School of Forestry, Forestry and Agricultural University of Fujian for their coordination. The authors also wish to thank Xia Zhao, the Research Institute of Tropical Forestry of the Chinese Academy for helping to draw the sketch map of Fujian and China.

References

Rao, I.V.R. and C. B. Sastry, 1998. Foreword. In: Walter Liese(Ed.). The anatomy of bamboo culms. Beijing: INBAR, 3 p.

Susiarti, S. and B. Soedjito, 1996. The role of Schizostachyum brachycladum in the Dayak Kenyah Community in East Kalimantan, Indonesia. In: Rao, I.V.R. & C.B. Sastry(Eds). Bamboo, people and the environment, proceedings of the Vth international bamboo workshop and the IV international bamboo congress, Ubud, Bali, Indonesia, 19-22 June, 1995. INBAR, Vol. 4, 91-96 p.

¹ Research Institute of Tropical Forestry, Chinese Academy of Forestry, Longdong, Guangzhou 510520, P. R. China. Tel: +86-20-87032612; E-mail: [email protected]; Homepage: http://rattan.home.sohu.com;

² School of Agriculture and Forestry, Linyi Teachers University, 18 Tongda, Lanshan, Linyi 276005, Shandong, P. R. China