How should the cotton production model in the Yangtze River Basin be built? The Ministry of Agriculture is exploring

Due to the growth of cotton consumption within the Yangtze River Basin, both the local cotton purchase volume and export volume have shown a declining trend. However, the economic benefits of cotton production in this region are higher than the national average, and the conditions for developing cotton production are favorable. In addition, the Yangtze River Basin is also an important textile industry base in China, and developing cotton production can provide ample raw materials for the textile industry.

The Yangtze River Basin is one of China's three major high-quality cotton regions, but the mechanization rate of cotton production is only about 20%. Coupled with the shortage of rural labor, cotton production in the Yangtze River Basin is struggling. In order to accelerate the improvement of the mechanization level of cotton production, the Ministry of Agriculture is focusing on implementing the "National Cotton Production Full-Process Mechanization Technology Demonstration Project" in Zhijiang City, Hubei Province, and other places, comprehensively exploring a cotton mechanized production model in China's Yangtze River Basin.

The climate in the Yangtze River Basin is humid and rainy, and cotton planting areas are small and scattered, all of which pose considerable challenges to the mechanization of cotton production. According to Liu Hong'an, director of the Zhijiang City Agricultural Machinery Bureau, at the very beginning of the project, the agricultural machinery department of Hubei Province organized experts to conduct multiple surveys and experiments, and ultimately selected two varieties, Zhongnongmian 63 and Sumian 24, as the experimental varieties for the project. On May 24-25, the fields were mechanically rotary-tilled, using a shallow rotary method with 3 passes. On May 25, the first batch of demonstration plots was mechanically sown, and on June 5, the second batch of demonstration plots was mechanically sown. During the mechanical sowing of cotton, the requirements for machine-picked cotton were strictly followed, with a plant spacing of 19 cm and a row spacing of 76 cm, ensuring that the plant and row spacing were consistent with the requirements of the cotton picker, with more than 4,500 plants per mu, ensuring the combination of agricultural machinery and agronomy and creating conditions for later mechanical harvesting.

In order to test the results of the project implementation over the past half year, in late November, the Agricultural Mechanization Department of the Ministry of Agriculture organized experts from the Hubei Provincial Agricultural Machinery Bureau, the Hubei Academy of Agricultural Sciences, the ** Academy of Land Reclamation Sciences, and other relevant departments to accept the project through on-site demonstrations. During the on-site demonstration session, 1 John Deere backpack-type single-row cotton harvester and 1 Changpai-brand 4MZ-3 three-row cotton harvester demonstrated cotton harvesting operations. In less than half an hour, the field originally full of snow-white cotton became a bare expanse. The acceptance team unanimously agreed that the project passed acceptance. "Through the integration of agricultural machinery and agronomy and the integration and application of full-process mechanization technology in cotton production, cost savings and income increases of more than 300 yuan per mu can be achieved on average." As one of the project leaders, Liu Hong'an said excitedly in the face of the acceptance results.

China's mechanized cotton production is mainly concentrated in the ** cotton region, while mechanized cotton production in the Yangtze River Basin cotton region has only just started and is still in the exploratory stage. Although the project has played a good demonstration role for full-process mechanized cotton production in the Yangtze River Basin, the problems and difficulties in the project implementation process still cannot be ignored. On the day of the demonstration, the reporter saw at the site that although machine-picked cotton is highly efficient, its harvest quality still falls considerably short of manual picking. On the one hand, because there was light rain at the time and the air humidity was high, the effect of machine-picked cotton was affected, and many cotton bolls still remained; on the other hand, due to technical limitations, most mechanically picked cotton still needed a second round of manual picking before harvesting could be fully completed. Moreover, the impurity content of mechanically picked cotton is high. A cotton farmer visiting the site told the reporter that manual cotton picking only removes the cotton bolls, and the picked cotton is very clean and intact and will not damage the cotton fibers, while mechanically picked cotton contains too many impurities and also breaks the cotton fibers, which seriously affects the selling price of the cotton. It can be seen that how to improve the quality of machine-picked cotton is indeed one of the urgent problems to be solved in full-process mechanized cotton production.

In response to this problem, Zhou Liming, deputy director of the Hubei Provincial Agricultural Machinery Bureau, said that the issue of the impurity content of machine-picked cotton is unavoidable, and how to reduce impurities to the lowest possible level through machinery is one of the key issues for the next step of research in full-process mechanized cotton production. "Improving the quality of machine-picked cotton so that the cotton can fetch a good price is our wish, and even more so the wish of cotton farmers. It would be even better if a cotton cleaning machine that follows the cotton picker could be developed," Zhou Liming said.

The focus of full-process mechanized cotton production falls on the word "machinery," but the high price of cotton pickers first of all hinders the path to their promotion and widespread use. At present, most of the cotton pickers used in China are imported from foreign countries, with an average price of more than 2 million yuan. This price is difficult for ordinary cotton farmers to bear, and even cooperatives and enterprises do not dare to purchase them easily without the guarantee of large-area operations.

In addition to cotton pickers, the selection and matching of machinery also affects mechanized cotton production in the Yangtze River Basin. For example, in the mechanized sowing stage of cotton, because the power wheel and the sowing plate of the seeder are in a straight line, the power wheel presses over the soil after sowing, causing the sowing furrow to be too deep. If rainy weather occurs, it will seriously affect seed germination and later cotton growth. "Choosing supporting machinery suitable for cotton production in the Yangtze River Basin is very critical. If existing models cannot meet the local cotton planting requirements, they must be improved as supporting equipment. Research on and promotion of matching models are also the focus of our next step of work," Zhou Liming said.

Improving the level of full-process mechanization in cotton production in the Yangtze River Basin is a systematic project. From the breeding of cotton varieties to field management and then to cotton harvesting, every link needs to develop in sync. This requires coordination among government departments, research institutes and universities, agricultural machinery enterprises, and other relevant departments, with key support for the weak links in full-process mechanized cotton production, so that full-process mechanized cotton production in the Yangtze River Basin can be realized as soon as possible.