China continues campaign to forcibly displace Tibetan nomads

Authorities forcing nomads to return their Grassland Use Certificates

Chinese authorities have reneged on promises of non-intervention in the lives of Tibetan nomads

Anonymous sources report that Chinese authorities in Yushul Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Qinghai Province, have begun seizing Grassland Use Certificates from nomadic Tibetans, proclaiming that the Chinese government is the sole owner of the Tibetan grasslands. Following the enforcement of Grassland Law in 1985, these certificates conveyed the right of their owners to use the grassland for livestock grazing and nomadic settlement. However, sources report that owners of these certificates are being forced to hand these documents back to the government, signing official contracts stating that they agree to do so without any option to protest.

An anonymous local source who spoke to Tibet Watch told the organisation: “Previously, the Chinese authorities have given Grassland Use Certificates to Tibetan nomads, declaring grazing rights for 50 years while guaranteeing non-intervention from the government. Beginning this year, they have withdrawn these grazing rights and have started collecting previously given grazing rights certificates from nomads.”

Authorities attempted to justify these actions by stating that they were to ensure more efficient management of the nomadic community. However, an anonymous source in the region expressed scepticism at the government’s professed altruism, explaining that these certificate seizures were a part of a larger campaign to concentrate the nomadic community in one location, to ensure greater control and surveillance of nomadic peoples. 

Grassland Use Certificates were intended to ensure non-intervention from the Chinese government and allow nomads to continue living and farming on their ancestral lands for 50 years.

Tibet Watch’s local source added: “Tibetan people are worried about the loss of grazing rights, the dispossession of ancestral lands, and greater control, monitoring, and surveillance from the state.” 

Reportedly, this policy of certificate seizure started around August 2020. A series of meetings were held by the Chinese authorities this year, where a 17-page document was distributed outlining pastureland management and grazing rights. In these meetings, authorities explained that the nation is the sole owner of the grasslands, and that, whenever it is desired, the grasslands will be confiscated from the nomads.

Chinese authorities have been overseeing the mass relocation of Tibetan nomads from their pastures into urban areas for decades. The pretext has often been “ecological preservation”, as was the case when Tibetans were relocated from Sanjiangyuan National Park, the source of three major Tibetan rivers. The policy of forcibly resettling nomads directly causes them to lose their source of food and livelihood and has also opened up lands for companies to extract minerals. The inability for policy-makers to engage Tibetan nomads’ indigenous knowledge of sustainability aggravates global heating on the wider Tibetan plateau as well as the source of rivers.