Thứ ba, Tháng tư 29, 2025
Google search engine
HomeSorted by levelC1 - AdvancedChina harvests vegetables in South China Sea to cultivate territorial claims

China harvests vegetables in South China Sea to cultivate territorial claims

[Reading level: C1 – Advanced]

China’s navy recently harvested 1.5 tons of vegetables on its biggest military base and civilian center in the Paracel Islands, in what state media portrayed as vindication of Beijing’s position that disputed land features it claims in the South China Sea can sustain human life.

 

The navy has completed a sand-to-soil cultivation project on Woody Island in collaboration with a top-tier Chinese research university, potentially paving the way for self-sufficient farming on China’s other occupied reefs and rocks in the South China Sea, the Global Times reported on Wednesday.

 

People’s Liberation Army Navy troops garrisoned on Woody Island, which is China’s main administrative center in the contested sea region, harvested vegetables from a beach that had been tested with an experimental treatment that turns sand into fertile soil. The project had been set up by a research team from Chongqing Jiaotong University.

 

Controversially, China has undertaken massive land reclamation works on disputed features in the Paracels and Spratly Islands in recent years to establish bases and advance its sweeping sovereignty claims over the South China Sea, which are contested by five other governments, including the Philippines, Malaysia and Vietnam.

 

The Global Times cited Chen Xiangmiao, an assistant research fellow at the National Institute for South China Sea Studies, as saying that the vegetable harvest on Woody Island countered international theories, including those in a 2016 arbitration case between the Philippines and China, that islands in the South China Sea could not support communities of their own.

 

“Now China’s capability of being able to support civilians on these islands would allow more people to live on the islands,” Chen was quoted as saying.

 

Under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), features must be capable of sustaining human habitation and an independent economy not reliant on imports of supplies from elsewhere to qualify as islands. Such features generate an exclusive economic zone around the island for the occupying state.

 

None of China’s military bases and artificial islands in the South China Sea currently meet this standard, and as such they were ruled to be rocks or other non-island features in the 2016 Permanent Court of Arbitration ruling.

 

Making artificial islands and reclaimed reefs in the South China Sea habitable for human life has been a perennial problem for China, as the settlements China has built there lack freshwater and any soil to grow things in. Previous attempts to build greenhouses and import fertile soil from the mainland failed to provide enough food for the garrisons maintained on bases like Woody Island in the Paracels and Fiery Cross Reef in the Spratlys.

 

Woody Island ‘increasingly self-sufficient’ – Đảo Phú Lâm ‘dần tự túc’

Zachary Haver, a Washington-based China analyst, said Sansha City – the prefecture-level city set up on Woody Island – was still reliant on regular deliveries of supplies from Hainan, although it is the hallmark of China’s reclamation efforts in the South China Sea.

 

This being said, Woody Island is increasingly self-sufficient, at least in some respects, with robust electricity generation and seawater desalination capabilities,” Haver explained. According to him, local government officials in Sansha City have also deployed a range of incentives such as subsidies and public housing schemes to attract civilians to come live on the island.

 

While the members of the research team that set up the sand-to-soil project on Woody Island go unnamed, Chongqing Jiaotong University has previously experimented with the same methods to great success in Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region and in a partnership with the United Arab Emirates.

 

China has a well-recorded problem with desertification, owing to poor farming practices and a lack of groundwater. Roughly 20 percent of the country is desert, lending urgency to scientific efforts to reverse the desert’s encroachment on fertile land.

 

Professor Yi Zhijian developed and pioneered a ground-breaking cellular paste that can turn sand into fertile soil, publishing his work with it in 2016. That paste was then used for the cultivation project on Woody Island, according to the PLA Navy.

 

This project could potentially have applications across other Chinese-occupied features in the South China Sea – even if it doesn’t strengthen China’s claim to sovereignty over features in the first place. China bases those claims on a notion of “historic rights” unsupported by international law.

 

“The development of Woody Island is often seen as the blueprint for the development of other features in the South China Sea,” Haver said. “This is currently most noticeable on Tree Island in the Paracel Islands. The Woody Island model will likely be (or is already being) expanded to China’s artificial island bases in the Spratly Islands.”

 

Taiping Island – Đảo Thái Bình

China is not the only claimant in the South China Sea to insist its occupied features are islands, and experiment with ways to make them habitable under the provisions of UNCLOS.

 

Taiwan currently occupies the largest feature in the Spratly, called Taiping Island, which was also ruled as a rock under the 2016 arbitral ruling. The Taiwanese military claimed the existence of fresh water on Taiping back in 2019.

 

This would further Taiwan’s argument that Taiping is a legally valid island, as a lack of a freshwater supply was cited by the Permanent Court of Arbitration as a reason that Taiping could not be considered so. Taiwan has also reportedly grown various vegetation on Taiping, including bananas, coconuts, and squash, without importing soil or using the same sand-to-soil methods as China.

 

The Philippines has also attempted to grow a sustainable food source on Thitu Island, a feature it occupies in the South China Sea, but with less urgency and success. Desalination plants to turn sea water into freshwater are planned to be built on the island this year, Philippine media have reported.

 

Source: https://www.benarnews.org/english/news/philippine/Woody-Island-vegetables-05212020183928.html?fbclid=IwAR2Co66_U798HEt0_NN7w1LEtj9p28IJ3-rExL7vTXORfCUXBaMcEbwTITM

WORD BANK:

Paracel Islands (n): quần đảo Hoàng Sa (Việt Nam)

Spratly Islands (n): quần đảo Trường Sa (Việt Nam)

portray /pɔːˈtreɪ/ [C2] (v): miêu tả

vindication /ˌvɪn·dɪˈkeɪ·ʃən/ (n): minh chứng

disputed /dɪˈspjuː.tɪd/ (adj): bị tranh chấp

contested /ˈkɒn.tes.tɪd/ (adj): bị tranh chấp

sustain /səˈsteɪn/ [C2] (v): duy trì sự sống của con người

Woody Island (n): đảo Phú Lâm

top-tier /tɒpˈtɪər/ (adj): hàng đầu

pave the way for sth (v): mở đường cho việc gì

self-sufficient /ˌself.səˈfɪʃ.ənt/ [C2] (adj): tự cung tự cấp

garrison /ˈɡær.ɪ.sən/ (n, v): quân đồn trú, đồn trú

administrative center /ədˈmɪn.ɪ.strə.tɪv ˈsen.tər/ (n): trung tâm hành chính

fertile /ˈfɜː.taɪl/ [C2] (adj): màu mỡ

controversial /ˌkɒn.trəˈvɜː.ʃəl/ [B2] (adj): gây tranh cãi

undertake /ˌʌn.dəˈteɪk/ [C1] (v): tiến hành, thực hiện

land reclamation (n): cải tạo đất đai (lấn biển)

sweeping /ˈswiː.pɪŋ/ (adj): sâu rộng

sovereignty claim /ˈsɒv.rɪn.ti kleɪm/ (n): yêu sách chủ quyền

cite /saɪt/ (v): trích lời, viện dẫn

counter /ˈkaʊn.tər/ (v): đi ngược lại, chống lại

arbitration /ˌɑː.bɪˈtreɪ.ʃən/ (n): trọng tài

exclusive economic zone /ɪkˈskluː.sɪv iː.kəˈnɒm.ɪk zəʊn/ (n): vùng đặc quyền kinh tế

habitable /ˈhæb.ɪ.tə.bəl/ (adj): có thể sinh sống được

perennial /pəˈren.i.əl/ (adj): lâu năm

settlement /ˈset.əl.mənt/ [C2] (n): nơi định cư

prefecture-level city /ˈpriː.fek.tʃər/ (n): thành phố trực thuộc tỉnh

hallmark /ˈhɔːl.mɑːk/ (n): dấu ấn

This/That being said (adv): mặc dù vậy

robust /rəʊˈbʌst/ (adj): mạnh mẽ

desalination /ˌdiː.sæl.ɪˈneɪ.ʃən/ (n): khử mặn

incentive /ɪnˈsen.tɪv/ [C2] (n):  ưu đãi

subsidy /ˈsʌb.sɪ.di/ [C1] (n): trợ cấp

desertification /dɪˌzɜː.tɪ.fɪˈkeɪ.ʃən/ (n): sa mạc hóa

roughly /ˈrʌf.li/ [B2] (adv): khoảng

reverse /rɪˈvɜːs/ [C1] (v): đảo ngược

encroach /ɪnˈkroʊtʃ/ (v): xâm lấn

pioneer /ˌpaɪəˈnɪər/ [C2] (v): đi tiên phong

ground-breaking /ˈɡraʊndˌbreɪ.kɪŋ/ (adj): mang tính đột phá

cellular /ˈsel.jə.lər/ (adj): thuộc về tế bào

paste /peɪst/ (n): hồ dán, hỗn hợp lỏng và dính

application /ˌæp.lɪˈkeɪ.ʃən/ [C2] (n): ứng dụng

notion /ˈnəʊ.ʃən/ [C1] (n): quan điểm

blueprint /ˈbluː.prɪnt/ (n): bản vẽ chi tiết

claimant /ˈkleɪ.mənt/ (n): nước đưa ra yêu sách

insist /ɪnˈsɪst/ [B1] (v): khẳng định

provision /prəˈvɪʒ.ən/ (n): điều khoản, quy định

arbitral ruling (n): phán quyết của trọng tài


NG HỘ READ TO LEAD!

Chào bạn! Có thể bạn chưa biết, Read to Lead là một trang giáo dục phi lợi nhuận với mục đích góp phần phát triển cộng đồng người học tiếng Anh tại Việt Nam. Chúng tôi không yêu cầu người đọc phải trả bất kỳ chi phí nào để sử dụng các sản phẩm của mình để mọi người đều có cơ hội học tập tốt hơn. Tuy nhiên, nếu bạn có thể, chúng tôi mong nhận được sự hỗ trợ tài chính từ bạn để duy trì hoạt động của trang và phát triển các sản phẩm mới.

Bạn có thể ủng hộ chúng tôi qua 1 trong 2 cách dưới đây.
– Cách 1: Chuyển tiền qua tài khoản Momo.
Số điện thoại 0947.886.865 (Chủ tài khoản: Nguyễn Tiến Trung)
Nội dung chuyển tiền: Ủng hộ Read to Lead
hoặc
– Cách 2: Chuyển tiền qua tài khoản ngân hàng.
Ngân hàng VIB chi nhánh Hải Phòng
Số tài khoản: 012704060048394 (Chủ tài khoản: Nguyễn Tiến Trung)
Nội dung chuyển tiền: Ủng hộ Read to Lead

RELATED ARTICLES

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here

- Advertisment -
Google search engine

Most Popular