Year in review: Most touching stories of 2019

Three generations in Gansu pass on fight against desertification

In the early 1980s, six villagers known as the "Six Old Men" started battling desertification in Gulang county of Northwest China's Gansu province.

When the "Six Old Men" began their work, the eldest of the group was 62 years old and the youngest 40. In 1981, they signed a joint contract to set up Babusha Forest Farm, pooled some money to buy seedlings and started forestation. In the early days, they met many difficulties but never gave up, ultimately achieving their goal of turning a desert into green space.

They vowed to persuade their children and grandchildren to follow them and continue forestation after they died.

In 38 years, three generations, together with other forest farmworkers, have turned more than 24,666 hectares of desert into green areas. They have planted over 40 million trees. In the protected area of the Babusha Forest Farm, the vegetation coverage rate has increased from less than 3 percent to more than 70 percent.