Xinchengximen lies just 5 kilometers from Turpan's downtown, so most of the young people live in the village but work in the city. That means most of the breeders are seniors.

"Some have difficulty climbing up to the roofs. We encourage them to join the cooperative to gain easier access to the cages and to collect the scattered pigeons to form a large-scale breeding operation," Askar said.

So far, 10 villagers have registered with the cooperative.

"We will conduct a survey of how many people want to start breeding but haven't yet done so. At the end of this year, we plan to involve all the individual breeders in the cooperative," Askar said.

"By developing new industries, including pigeon breeding, we aim to double our villagers' incomes within three years."