He now plants around 20 saplings every day. He sources the saplings from the local forestry authority, finds them in the mountains or buys them at a local market.

"Each tree brings hope, and hope makes life meaningful," he says.

Liu is not the only local obsessed with planting trees. On Feb 11, the first workday after the Lunar New Year holiday, executive and grassroots officials from Guizhou spent the day planting trees in suburban areas - an annual custom that started in 2015.

Sun Zhigang, Party chief of the province, says the local government would work to balance economic development with ecological conservation, on the way to building a more beautiful Guizhou and improving people's livelihoods.

The forest cover of Guizhou province extended to 57 percent of the landmass in 2018, an increase of 10 percentage points within three years. By 2020, this figure is expected to reach 60 percent, officials said at the 2019 forestry work conference held in February.

Data from the National Forestry and Grassland Administration showed that forestry coverage in China stood at 21.66 percent in 2018. The same figure worldwide stands at 30.6 percent, according to a report by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

"The expansion of forestry will help to improve the ecological environment, by preserving the soil and water, creating natural windbreaks, stabilizing the sands and purifying the air," says Li Tao, 31, an engineer at the forest resources management station in Guiyang.