People in the town of Shache in northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region are beginning to pick strawberries grown on the alkaline land. 

Xinjiang has the largest area of saline-alkali soils in China, accounting for about a third of the country's total. As a result, the agriculture and economy in Xinjiang has been hurdled by this fact. 

However in the village of Keshilake, strawberries planted in the greenhouses are thriving. "We've ameliorated the alkaline soil, reducing its alkalinity by 70 percent and increasing the contents of organic matters by 50 percent," said Zhang Ting, manager of the Shanghai agricultural company that provides voluntary service in Xinjiang.

Due to its many sunny days and the wide difference in temperature variance between seasons, Xinjiang is a good place to grow fruit. Despite the variety of fruits in the area, strawberries are less common and because of this, more expensive. Now, the villagers can not only enjoy locally-grown strawberries, but they can sell it to improve their income. 

Alkaline soil is clay soil with a high pH (> 8.5). And this type of soil usually contains more sodium, calcium and magnesium than acidic or neutral soil, which makes it less soluble. As plants growing requests suitable pH (6.0-7.0, slightly acidic to neutral) and nutrition, alkaline soil is not very friendly to most of the plants because of its poor soil structure and low infiltration capacity.  

Reclamation of saline-alkali land has been conducted since ancient times. Apart from the traditional way such as providing proper drainage, using acidic fertilizer or organic manure, there are some new technologies being applied in the region, such as growing salt tolerant crops to reduce the salt content.