Assessment of Super Rice Variety Adaptability Urgently Needs Strengthening

Vice Minister of Agriculture Zhang Taolin said at a press conference held by the State Council Information Office on the 14th that the requirements for super rice are high yield, high quality, high efficiency, and also resistance. However, some super rice varieties are suitable for specific regions, and when they are introduced to other regions, their shortcomings become apparent. Regarding the recent problems of yield reduction and total crop failure of some super rice in Anhui, Zhang Taolin said that this variety is suitable for the Jianghuai region including Anhui, but its shortcoming is that its resistance to rice blast is relatively poor. It happened that last year was a relatively unusual year, so the resistance problem was exposed.

Different super rice varieties have different regional resistance

Reporter: Recently, issues concerning super rice have attracted relatively much public attention. May I ask if you could respond to them?

Zhang Taolin: Super rice is a very important action plan, and also a very important means of increasing grain output and ensuring national food security. We have now reached the 17th phase of super rice, from 700 kg, 800 kg, 900 kg, and not long ago it exceeded 1,000 kg. Super rice still uses heterosis, as well as plant architecture shaping, to achieve high yield. Our requirements for super rice are also high yield, high quality, high efficiency, and resistance. We must not only consider its high yield potential, but also enhance its resistance, including its quality and all other aspects.

Now that agriculture has developed, it is necessary to combine good seeds with good methods and combine agricultural technology with agronomic practices to solve problems comprehensively, but the variety is a very important link, and the excellence of the variety itself is very important. Therefore, in terms of super rice, we require that future assessment of whether it is good or bad should look at its yield and benefits, and at the same time we should look at its resource use efficiency, for example, nutrients, how efficient the use of nutrients is after additional chemical fertilizer is applied, and how its resistance to diseases, insects, and weeds is.

Now, in the process of research and development of super rice, the varieties themselves are also constantly being updated and improved. Some varieties may be good in a certain trait, for example, high yield, but poor in resistance. What we need to cultivate now is a relatively more comprehensive variety. Our variety approval is for a specific region, where it can play its role, but when it reaches another region, its shortcomings may emerge. For example, if its resistance is poor, it will not work when placed in another region.

Reporter: What is now being hotly discussed is the individual case of Anhui's Liangyou 0293, where yield reduction and total crop failure occurred. Is it related to climate and pollution? What are the reasons, and will it affect our research on super rice?

Zhang Taolin: Recently everyone has been paying relatively much attention, and in fact the Ministry of Agriculture has also explained this issue. As I understand it, it is still related to the reasons I mentioned earlier. Each variety has an adaptive region. Calculated according to a normal year, this variety is suitable for the Jianghuai region including Anhui, but during the variety approval process, one shortcoming of this variety was that its resistance to rice blast was relatively poor. It happened that last year was a relatively unusual year, so its shortcoming in resistance was exposed. Therefore, assessment of variety adaptability still needs to be strengthened.

White pollution is prominent in the northwest; fertilizer and pesticide use is severe in the central and eastern regions

Reporter: Minister Zhang, could you please specify the current overall situation of agricultural non-point source pollution in our country?

⟦NL> Zhang Taolin: The overall situation of agricultural non-point source pollution is not optimistic, but there are many types of pollution and they are widely distributed, and the differences among various types in different regions are relatively large. For example, in the arid regions of the northwest, due to the large-scale use of agricultural film, the problem of agricultural film pollution and white pollution is relatively prominent. For example, in the central and eastern regions, due to the use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides, plus special living and climatic conditions, the problem of non-point source pollution from pesticides and chemical fertilizers may be relatively prominent. For another example, in our south, because the level of large-scale livestock and poultry breeding is relatively high and the scale is also relatively large, relatively speaking, the problem of pollution from agricultural livestock and poultry manure may be relatively prominent.

The current situation of agricultural non-point source pollution is that there has been improvement in some areas, especially through some effective prevention and control measures we have adopted, including soil testing and formulated fertilization, green prevention and control, and the application of some clean production materials and technologies, especially in some key prevention and control areas, including Dianchi Lake, Chaohu Lake, and Taihu Lake, where there has been some improvement, but there are also some places where the problem is relatively prominent and still shows a trend of intensification.

The current non-point source pollution is a key problem we need to address. One is the pollution problem of chemical fertilizers and pesticides. The overall use of chemical fertilizers is still relatively high, and the utilization rate of chemical fertilizers is still not high. The problems are especially prominent in fruit trees and vegetables.

Second, in terms of pesticides, the current amount of pesticide use, we say, should be controlled at 300,000 tons, and it is now around 320,000 tons. Compared with developed countries, our pesticide utilization rate still has a relatively large gap. How to solve this problem? Mainly through new types of high-efficiency, low-toxicity, low-residue pesticides, including the development of biological pesticides, and combining them with unified pest prevention and control technologies. But the scope of application of our current unified prevention and control and specialized prevention and control measures is still not particularly wide, so we take this as a key focus of work to be strengthened next, raising the coverage rate of green prevention and control of crop diseases and insect pests to above 30%. In addition, livestock and poultry manure is the largest source of agricultural non-point source pollution. In our agricultural non-point source pollution, more than about 90% of COD comes from livestock and poultry manure. We now raise 1.2 billion head of live pigs, with about 700 million head slaughtered each year, and the speed of large-scale breeding is now relatively fast. For large-scale breeding of more than 500 head, it can reach about 40%. After large-scale breeding, if done well, it can be centrally treated, improve utilization efficiency, and raise the level of industrialization, but if improperly handled, or if supporting facilities cannot keep up, it may even produce environmental incidents. That is why we strengthen clean breeding and standardized breeding, especially the construction of supporting facilities. We propose that more than 75% of large-scale livestock and poultry farms be equipped with waste storage, treatment, and utilization facilities.