Fan Chuan Zhao, a normal Chinese farmer from Shandong Province in eastern China, is managing a farm near Khartoum, in which he has employed some 20 Sudanese workers coming from the troubled western Sudanese region of Darfur.

"The Darfurians are desperately poor, I must do my best to help them," the 40-year-old Fan said.

Khalil Ibrahim, 27, a Darfurian working in the farm, has been in a good mood in these days because he will soon go back home at Amtajuk, a village not very far away from Geneina, the capital of West Darfur State, which has been the most restive state of the three states in Darfur.

"Now I can back home to reunite with my family because I have saved enough money for the trip," he said, noting that he has not been back to Darfur since he came to work in the farm in 2005.

But he stressed that he would come back to the farm to continue his work here after spending two or three months at home, adding that an obvious improvement of security situation in his hometown was another reason for him to decide to visit his family.

Ibrahim's parents and a child are still living in Amtajuk. In the past two years, Ibrahim has sent most of his wages regularly to his family.

He said he was satisfied of working in the farm, where he was earning a stable income enough for sustaining his family.

Besides of that, he said, the Chinese manager, farming technician and other 7 Chinese workers in the farm were treating the Sudanese workers as equals and teaching them a lot of farming techniques and knowledge.

Mohammed Yagoub, 38, is one of the few Darfurians who have worked in the farm longer than others, has become a foreman earning the highest wage among the Darfurian workers.

Yagoub, a father of nine children, told Xinhua reporter that most of the Darfurians came to work in the farm in the past two or three years, leaving their families in Darfur.

"Because of the money sent back by the Darfurian workers, none of their family members has resorted to refugee camps in Darfur," he noted, saying that some of his friends are currently living in the refugee camps because of the unstable security situation as well as their living difficulties.

About one million of civilians have been displaced since armed conflicts erupted in Darfur in February, 2003 because of the poverty, struggles for natural resources and the political powers.

The Chinese farmer Fan revealed that he decided to set up a farm, which is located some 20 kilometers north of Khartoum, after he knew that there were many displaced Darfurians in the nearby villages, he wanted to offer them help.

"I decided to offer helps for them as hearing that there were displaced Darfurians in the nearby villages when I started managing this farm," Fan told Xinhua.

He explained from bottom of his heart that "If you give a destitute person one bag of rice, he is surely not to die in the day after eating the rice, but if you give him a chance of work, he will never die of hunger."

The Chinese farmer also decided that he would open another farm in Darfur after the security situation to be changed better, he believed that the area is one of the best regions in this African country in natural resources.

(China Daily May 18, 2007)