ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to discover the spatial relationship between maize cultivation since the Qianlong reign in the Qing Dynasty and the rocky desertification documented in the Republican period based on a quantitative analysis on data from memorials to the throne, local gazetteers of the Qing and archives from the Republican period. According to Xian Jinshan's timetable of the earliest records of maize in different provinces of China, Guizhou was the twelfth province to grow maize. Henan has maize cultivation documented in 1551, followed by Jiangsu, Gansu, Yunnan, Zhejiang, Anhui, Fujian, Shandong, Shaanxi, and Hebei. Xian's argument regarding Guizhou is based on Treatise on Benefiting the People written in the Ming Dynasty and quoted by the Zunyi Prefecture Gazetteer compiled in the twenty-first year of the Daoguang reign. According to a land use survey of 45 counties of Guizhou, the land was classified into three categories, namely, land which cannot produce, land that has been used and land that can produce.
