As China enters autumn, a dark, furry-clawed crustacean – no larger than a human palm – becomes one of the most sought-after delicacies in the country.

Chinese hairy crabs, a national obsession traditionally raised in the freshwater lakes of the Yangtze River Delta, are now being farmed on a stretch of salt-affected alkaline wasteland in the northwest province of Shaanxi.

The area along Yellow River floodplains is unsuitable for conventional crops, but farmers have transformed over 600 hectares (1,482 acres) for hairy crab cultivation, generating an estimated total output value of 90 million yuan (US$13.5 million), the People’s Daily website reported on Tuesday.

The effort reflects a broader trend, as farmers and scientists explore ways to make use of vast areas of salty land and waters under Beijing’s directive to diversify the food supply for its 1.4 billion population to safeguard food security.

Scientists are intensifying the development of new crop varieties tolerant to salty and alkaline conditions. The crops include rice, China’s most eaten grain, and soybeans, according to official media reports.

“China’s overall food security strategy has shifted from protecting 1.8 billion mu of farmland to seeking food from all of its territory, including saline-alkali land, forests, grasslands and waters,” said Zheng Fengtian, a professor of agricultural economics at Beijing’s Renmin University.

China has about 1.5 billion mu of saline-alkali land, of which about 500 million mu could be developed for agriculture, he noted.

As geopolitical risks intensify and climate change brings more extreme weather, food security is gaining more concern worldwide. In its external messaging, China has stressed that its per capita grain availability is higher than international standards, while in practice it has maintained strict farmland protection measures and emphasised self-sufficiency.

To make use of salty and alkaline land and lakes, China is investing heavily in breeding salt-alkali-tolerant crop varieties and developing methods to remediate saline and alkaline soil and water conditions, said Zheng.

“China can’t always rely on imports – especially as the US imposes sanctions from time to time. It must seek food from non-farmland resources,” he added.

Earlier this month, a new salt-alkali-tolerant soybean line, developed by Chinese agronomists, set a new national record for salt-alkali-tolerant soybean yield the Daily reported. The farm harvest in Dongying, Shandong province, recorded a measured yield of 404.85kg per mu.

The developer, the Yazhou Bay National Laboratory, a national-level laboratory focusing on seed-breeding innovation, has another salt-tolerant variety that had already been promoted in large-scale demonstrations, it said. Over 20 other new salt-alkali-tolerant lines and 1,000 screening materials are in small-area tests.

Soybeans are China’s most import-dependent agricultural product, with imports totalling nearly 112 million tonnes last year, mainly from Brazil and the US, according to customs data.

In Qingdao, breeders have developed a saline-alkali tolerant line of rice that recorded a yield of more than 500kg per mu last year. Its yield was expected to be higher this year, according to a researcher quoted in the Daily.

A leader in rice cultivation, China had a national average rice yield of 480.4kg per mu in 2025, according to its National Bureau of Statistics.