Ministry of Agriculture: Striving to Keep Winter Wheat Area Stable at 338 Million Mu in 2015
According to Xinhua News Agency, Vice Minister of Agriculture Yu Xinrong said on September 22 that efforts will be made to keep the winter wheat area stable at 338 million mu this year, and the winter rapeseed area stable at around 100 million mu.
Yu Xinrong said at the national autumn and winter planting work video conference held here that autumn and winter planting is the beginning of agricultural production for the following year, concerns absolute food security, sustained increase in farmers' incomes and sustainable agricultural development, and must be carried out promptly, effectively and solidly. The goal of stabilizing grain production and increasing incomes must be firmly upheld, the main line of transforming the development model and adjusting the structure must be adhered to, and all tasks of autumn and winter planting must be completed to high standards and with high quality, striving to bring this year's agricultural harvest to a good close and lay a solid foundation for next year's agricultural harvest, especially grain.
“This year's autumn and winter planting production tasks are extremely arduous; we must not only maintain a stable area and lay the foundation for a bumper harvest, but also optimize the variety structure and achieve quality improvement and efficiency gains.” Yu Xinrong stated that the word “stable” must be given priority, stabilizing the sown area, with the focus on advancing large-scale operations, ensuring that “stabilizing the area” and “adjusting the structure” are taken into account together, “ensuring grain” and “stabilizing oil” are taken into account together, and “grasping autumn sowing” and “promoting winter planting” are taken into account together.
At the same time, the word “improve” must be given precedence, improving sowing quality, with the focus on accelerating rush harvesting and rush sowing, ensuring that fine land preparation is in place, appropriate sowing rates are in place, and post-sowing compaction is in place. The word “transform” must be taken as the key, achieving innovative development, with the focus on water conservation, fertilizer conservation and pesticide conservation. The word “resist” must be given top priority, ensuring production safety, that is, resisting drought to preserve full stands, controlling excessive growth to prevent freezing damage, and moving the threshold forward to prevent pests and diseases.
Yu Xinrong said that autumn grain is about to enter the stage of large-scale harvesting, but still needs to pass through multiple hurdles such as cold dew wind, pests and diseases, and continuous overcast rain. All localities must make coordinated arrangements, press on without letup, and go all out to fight the closing battle of this year's agriculture.