Chinese ecologists are warning that the source of the Yellow River, China's second longest, will be turned into a vast desert area if effective measures are not taken immediately.

According to remote satellite sensing mapping, the ratio of desert land at the head of the Yellow River, which covers 3.8 million ha of land in northwest China's Qinghai Province, has risen from 3.9 percent in the 1970s and 1980s to 20 percent now. This is partially attributable to the sandstorms that are common in this region for much of the year.

A quarter of the 4,077 lakes in Madoi County at the river's source have now dried up, and as much as 88 million tons of silt from Qinghai wash down the Yellow River annually, making it one of the muddiest in the world.

China's central government and the Qinghai provincial government have decided to plant trees and grass on 333,3000 ha of poor land now being used for crop cultivation over the next 10 years to improve the ecological environment of the region.

A campaign to comprehensively treat desertification will be launched in Gonghe County, the most severely-affected area at the source of the Yellow River.