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Is China’s climate returning to that of Tang dynasty golden age? Experts warn of a trap

Higher rainfall across arid Ningxia has invited comparison to prosperous Tang dynasty ‘warm period’, but scientists offer a note of caution

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Local media in China's northwestern Ningxia Hui autonomous region are celebrating an unusual rainfall surge in the hope of "climate dividends". Photo: Handout
Holly Chik

In China’s arid northwest, state media have been celebrating an increase in much-needed rainfall.

The Ningxia Hui autonomous region usually averages about 300mm (about 12 inches) of rain per year, but the annual total has risen in recent years by around 12mm.

The rain belt was moving northwards, shifting the 400mm precipitation line – the vital boundary that separates China’s arid grazing lands from its humid, agricultural heartland, the Ningxia Broadcasting News Centre reported last month.

This “heavenly fortune” would bring “climate dividends”, the report said, promising that “loess soil will turn green and farming area will expand”.

During the Tang dynasty “warm period”, it said, temperatures in northern China were 1 to 2 degrees Celsius (1.8 Fahrenheit) higher than now, and the area that is Ningxia today used to serve as the granary north of the Great Wall.
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Flash flood at northwest China camping site kills 10, injures 23

“The warming and greening of northwest China is not accidental but the restart of a millennia-long climate cycle,” the broadcaster reported on social media on July 21.

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