Ma Youxiang on the development of the grass industry: recognize grass, value grass, develop grass

Grass plays an important role in the development of our country's agriculture and rural economy, especially in the development of the grass-fed livestock industry, and will continue to play an even more important role.

Grass is the foundation of modern grass-fed livestock development. Grass is the basic means of production for the grass-fed livestock industry, and is the food of grass-fed livestock. Without grass there is no grass-fed livestock industry, and without a modern grass industry there is no modern grass-fed livestock industry. In the United States, a modern livestock powerhouse, forage planting area has consistently been maintained at around 400 million mu, long ranking among the four major crops; hay output has been maintained at an average of around 140 million tons per year, generating an output value of nearly 50 billion US dollars. The industry chain related to grass, including research, extension, processing, machinery, storage and transport, and trade, is complete, and the grass industry is strong.

Grass is a major weak point in our country's livestock development. In recent years, demand in our country's cattle and sheep product market has been strong and prices have remained firm, but forage is in severe shortage. Last year our country's commercial grass output was 8.2963 million tons. Based on an estimate of each sheep unit consuming 1.8 kg of forage per day over a 100-day fattening period, the supported number of animals raised was less than 50 million sheep units, less than 1/10 of the total number raised. Feeding alfalfa is an effective measure for increasing dairy cow milk yield and improving milk quality, but our country's alfalfa output falls short of demand; last year alone nearly one million tons were imported, at prices far higher than grain and domestically produced forage.

⟦NL> Planting grass and promoting grass has great potential. Our country's agriculture has had consecutive years of bumper harvests, and the staple food grain issue has basically been stably resolved, making it possible to expand forage planting. As the level of large-scale breeding rises, demand for forage remains vigorous. Good grass feeds good livestock, and good livestock produces good milk (meat), which has become an industry consensus. As corn prices change, the comparative benefit advantage of planting grass is gradually emerging. The cultivation, harvesting and silage packaging technologies related to grass are already fairly mature, and the supporting conditions for equipment are basically in place. Many successful explorations have already been made across various regions, accumulating successful experience in planting grass to raise livestock and establishing grass as a business. It can be said that all conditions for planting grass and promoting grass are in place.

Concepts must come first. To plant grass and promote grass and develop the grass industry, the urgent task is to change concepts and re-recognize the status and role of grass. It is necessary to deeply understand and promptly implement the requirement put forward in this year's No. 1 Central Document, "support forage planting and promote the coordinated development of the three-part planting structure of grain, cash crops and forage," place grass planting in a more prominent position in agriculture's "transformation of development methods and structural adjustment," establish the concept that planting grass is planting grain (feed grain) and that planting grass is planting meat and milk, value grass planting as much as grain planting, and plant grass as one plants grain. It is necessary to be willing to use good farmland for planting grass and to be willing to invest, with intensive management, to truly turn grass into a big industry.

(The author is Director of the Department of Animal Husbandry of the Ministry of Agriculture and Director of the Grassland Supervision and Management Center)