The Great Chaco Plain is the highest quality large plain that mankind can currently develop, and it is more than enough to feed 500 million people, but this land is still in a serious state of abandonment.
The area of the Great Chaco Plain is 750,000 square kilometers, more than the sum of the North China Plain + the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River Plain + the Sichuan Basin, and our region has more than 800 million people. The latitude of the plain is comparable to that of the Ganges Plain, and the same size of plains in Bengal, India, feeds more than 1 billion people.
The average rainfall in the Great Chaco Plain is 1350 mm in the east and 500 mm in the west; the average annual temperature is about 20 degrees, and the heat is very abundant. In terms of latitude, rainfall and heat, the Grand Chaco Plain is very similar to the Ganges Plain.
But this Great Plain, which is mainly located in Argentina and includes parts of Paraguay and Bolivia, has a population of only a few million, less than one percent of the population of the Ganges Plain, and is largely undeveloped. In fact, the reason why the Great Chaco Plain is not developed is very simple, that is, the water conservancy project has not been done well, or to be precise, it has not been carried out.
This place is dominated by summer rainfall, because the terrain is flat, so a large amount of water, summer peak water area of more than 100,000 square kilometers, becoming the world's largest inland freshwater lake, but only short-term seasonal so it is not counted as a lake. The rest of the plain is also widely covered with swamps.
After the rainy season, the water surface begins to evaporate slowly, and finally various swamps and saline lands form, which is of course difficult to engage in agricultural production. This situation also leads to rainfall no less than in the Yangtze River, and the runoff of the La Plata River, which has a basin area of almost twice that of the Yangtze River, is still lower than that of the Yangtze River, because it is accumulated in the upstream evaporation cycle.
In fact, solving this problem is very simple, we will be in the era of Dayu Zhishui, coupled with modern technology, this is definitely not a difficult thing.
First dredge the river channel, build embankments on both sides, our Yellow River North China Plain and Yangtze River Hubei break have been doing this since ancient times.
Secondly, the construction of artificial lakes, in particularly low-lying areas around the embankment to build artificial lakes to store water, Dongting Lake is actually doing the same.
Again, we build reservoirs upstream, which we have in almost every township, storing water in the rainy season and releasing water for irrigation in the dry season.
Finally, the improvement of the land, in fact, the entire Jianghan Plain and the Dongting Lake Plain, and even the North China Plain are swamps, and soil improvement according to local conditions is enough.
What is the concept of a subtropical plain of 750,000 square kilometers? Even if two-thirds of the grain is grown, the 750 million mu of arable land is 750 million tons a year, which is more than China's grain production and enough for 1.5 billion to eat, so I say that this place is more than enough to feed 500 million people.
It is a pity that such a large piece of treasure to be developed has been limited for hundreds of years in the hands of argentina's brothers who do not lack land.
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