Xinjiang enters season of harvesting cash crops

Xinjiang in northwest China is entering the season to harvest its major cash crops, as sugar beets, chilly peppers, sea buckthorn and other crops are ripening in succession.

In a village of Jiashi County in the Uygur autonomous region, local farmers are using large harvesting machinery to reap sugar beets.

The county's rich resources of water, land, sunlight and heat resources plus steep temperature differences between day and night make it an ideal place to grow sugar beets.

Local authorities have promoted large-scale plantation and scientific field management to continuously improve the output. They have also built a processing industrial park, forming a more complete industrial chain and creating more job opportunities for farmers.

"We have built a circular industry chain of sugar production which has offered jobs to more than 10,000 people, and increased their income by more than 3,000 yuan (about 420 U.S. dollars) each on average," said Wang Fuli, director of the farm produce marketing service center of Jiashi County.

The more than 4,000 hectares of chilies grown in Wensu County of Xinjiang's Aksu Prefecture are also set to have a bumper harvest. Large piles of red hot peppers being dried on ground have attracted buyers from Sichuan, Shaanxi and Shandong provinces, far away from Xinjiang.

"The chili peppers here have a good color value, with desirable degree of dryness and quality. And there are hydraulic packers just on the sunning ground, which facilitates truck transportation," said Zhao Wenbing, a purchaser.

In Yanchi Town of Yiwu County, stretches of sea buckthorn woods are full of orange fruits, signaling another bumper harvest.

The town has cultivated 1,600 hectares of sea buckthorns, and one sixth of them have borne fruits. With forestry and fruit plantation and processing companies introduced here, the region has formed an integrated development mode covering seedling, planting, field management, harvesting, product research and development, processing and marketing, increasing incomes for more than 2,000 households of farmers and herdsmen every year.

Xinjiang enters season of harvesting cash crops

Xinjiang enters season of harvesting cash crops

Christopher Miller and Phil Lord, directors of the film Project Hail Mary, said their science fiction movie aims to showcase the heartwarming power of understanding and acceptance.

The film was released worldwide last Friday, grossing more than 140 million U.S. dollars in its opening weekend.

Not only has the film performed strongly at the box office, but it has also pushed the boundaries of science fiction with its heartwarming touch.

In the film, as the protagonist's only companion in the cosmos, Rocky's exterior is composed of irregular rocks, yet his personality is lively and endearing.

In an exclusive interview with China Central Television (CCTV) via video link, Miller and Lord said that to visualize this unique alien creature, they turned to the natural world for inspiration.

"We looked at lots of like minerals and like chrysoprase rough, which is a gemstone. And we loved the way that like there were veins of like pretty gemstones amongst more regular sandstone and rock," said Lord.

In addition to its exterior design, Rocky's body language is equally distinctive.

"The way that he moves is sometimes animal-like and sometimes it's like a cat or a dog, but also sometimes he's like a person. And then he also has ways of moving that are from his own alien culture that were invented by us and James Ortiz, the lead puppeteer who portrayed rocky," said Miller.

When two vastly different beings meet in space, their differences do not create a barrier; instead, they bring them closer together. With its imaginative sci-fi premise, the film tells the story of a friendship that transcends species.

"That's something that we can take with us in the world, as we come across people who are different from us and find common ground and make accommodations for each other and try and see the world through their eyes, and then pretty much anything is possible," said Miller.

U.S. science fiction movie tells story of heartwarming power