National spring sowing progress has exceeded 30 percent; research on green grain yield increase models will be carried out
According to the agricultural situation monitoring of the Ministry of Agriculture, all types of crops sown nationwide account for 35.0% of the intended spring sowing crop area, with progress comparable to the same period last year. Among them, 27.8% of grain has been sown, 42.1% of cotton, 36.0% of oil crops, 80.2% of sugar crops, and 64.7% of vegetables.
At present, early rice seedling raising across the country has basically ended, and the transplanted area accounts for 79.0% of the intended early rice area, with progress slightly slow, including 87.8% in South China and 73.5% in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River. Nationwide, the area of middle rice (single-season rice) already raised as seedlings (converted to field area) accounts for 82.9% of the intended middle rice area, 1.4 percentage points faster than the same period last year, among which the southwest region has basically ended, and the four provinces and regions of Northeast China are nearing completion.
Right now, agricultural departments at all levels are making every effort to implement all measures for spring plowing and spring sowing. First, optimize the structure and stabilize the area. Implement support policies for grain production, guide farmers to plant grain well, and stabilize the area of staple grain varieties such as rice and wheat. Reduce corn planting in high-latitude and arid areas according to local conditions, and switch to drought-tolerant miscellaneous grains, miscellaneous beans, tuber crops, silage corn, and other crops, striving to keep the grain area stable. Second, grasp scientific and technological innovation to increase per-unit yield. Continue to provide technical guidance for key links, do a good job in spring field management, and according to seedling conditions and climate characteristics, combine promotion and control, and implement key technologies by region and by crop. Highlight the creation of high-yield grain and research on green yield increase models, make every effort to overcome technical bottlenecks affecting per-unit yield improvement, quality improvement, benefit increase, and environmental improvement, integrate a set of high-yield and stable-yield, cost-saving and efficiency-increasing, green and environmentally friendly, replicable technical models, build a group of demonstration areas that advance both yield increase and efficiency increase and coordinate production and ecology in a sustainable way, and promote balanced yield increase. Third, strengthen infrastructure construction to improve capacity. Accelerate the designation of permanent basic farmland, strengthen farmland infrastructure construction, accelerate the construction of a group of high-standard farmland with guaranteed yields despite drought or excessive rain, and support the stable development of grain. In particular, strengthen the protection and improvement of cultivated land quality, carry out well the “cultivated land quality protection and improvement action”, improve soil, fertilize soil fertility, balance nutrients, and restore cultivated land, so as to realize “storing grain in the land”.
According to reports, this year, the Ministry of Agriculture will also organize and carry out nationwide research on green grain yield increase models, focusing on the “twelve major actions” such as water-saving irrigation for rice in Northeast China, capacity improvement for rice-wheat continuous cropping in the Jianghuai region, and development of potato staple food products and industry. Strive to achieve the “three improvements”, aiming by 2020 to increase grain per-unit yield by an average of 1 percentage point per year, increase the comprehensive mechanization rate of cultivation, planting, and harvesting of key grain crops by 10 percentage points, and increase the utilization rate of chemical fertilizers and pesticides to more than 40%. Strive to achieve the “two zero growths”, aiming by 2020 to achieve zero growth in the use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides in grain and agricultural production.