In the ring-shaped peripheral areas from the Dzungari Basin to the great desert of T'a-k'o-la-ma-kan, hundreds of thousands of people have been reclaiming wastelands in the depth of the Gobi and desert which cover several thousand square li.
The Ho-t'ien Special District in the Uighur Autonomous Region of Sinkiang, lying north of the K'un-lun Mountain and south of the T'a-k'o-la-ma-kan Desert, suffered regularly before the liberation from the menace of drought and sand storm.