China is the country with the largest population in the world, and
the majority part of this population are farmers. Facing a severe
shortage of water resources and farming land, China must not only
use seven percent arable land of the world to feed one fourth of
the world population, but also cope with the challenges resulting
from its accession to WTO. To the end, China has to rely on science
and technology to promote its agricultural industrialization and
modernization, Xu Guanhua, minister of science and technology, said
at a press conference sponsored by the State Council Information
Office on May 29.
Wei Jianguo, assistant to the minister of foreign trade and
economic cooperation and Cheng Andong, governor of Shaanxi
Province, also briefed the press on foreign trade and cooperation
in the sector of agricultural technology as well as on the 8th
China Yangling High-tech Fair, scheduled on November 5-9.
“China has made remarkable progress in bio-agricultural
technology,” said Xu. “We have so far cloned about 100 genes from
various species and established a genetic improvement technology
system for most major crops. We have acquired 180 kinds of
trans-genes plants with different features and 15 are under
mid-term test or mass planting test.”
In
terms of trans-genes plants, anti-worm rice, potato and corn are
under field test. Around 1.6 million hectares of anti-virus
trans-genes tobacco are planted. Anti-worm cotton has been applied
in a relatively large scale. Following the successful cloning of
embryo cell and cattle, pig, sheep and rabbit, China has also
developed rabbit with human interferon gene, pig with cattle growth
hormone.
The minister expressed his hope that China will catch up with the
developed countries in realizing biotechnology industrialization by
2005.
“We have applied information technology into agriculture and are
happy to see satisfactory results even it is used in some very
less-developed regions,” he said.
China has developed an Agricultural Expert system with many
branches to cover field management, fertilizer application, and
control of worms and diseases for wheat, rice, cotton and corn;
chicken and pig farming; and water irrigation. Hunan, for example,
has witnessed a big increase in its agricultural output.
The nation’s capacity in research and development of new fertilizer
and new farming materials has also remarkably increased. From 1993
to 1996, plastic membrane was adopted in 23 million hectares of
farmland. Various advanced green houses have been set up. The
growing and possessing technique of tomato, cucumber and flowers
are already of world advanced level.
Over the last decade, various water-saving irrigation technology
have been employed in different regions. By the end of 1998, over
15 million hectares of farmland had adopted water-saving
irrigation. The state has highlighted modern agriculture and
bio-agricultural technology in the 863 Program and will increase
input in agricultural technology development and application.
“We wish to build up a modern agriculture and sharpen its
competitive edge with high-tech application so as to enable our
traditional agriculture to take an enormous leap forward,” Xu
said.
(fwswk.com by Xu Zhiquan 05/30/2001)