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SEARCH
Yang Liu , Neil C. Turner , Miles Dyck , Bingcheng Si , Jialong
Lv , HailongHe
Key Laboratory of Resource Biology and Biotechnology in Western
China (Ministryof Education) andCollege of Life Science, Northwest
University, Xi’an, Shaanxi716000, China ([email protected])
UWA Institute of Agriculture and UWA School of Agriculture and
Environment, TheUniversity of Western Australia M062, Locked Bag
5005, Perth, WA 6001, Australia([email protected])
Department of Renewable Resources, University of Alberta,
Edmonton, AlbertaT6G 2E3, Canada ([email protected])
Departmetn of Soil Science, University of Saskatchewan,
Saskatoon, SaskatchewanS7N 5A8, Canada ([email protected])
College of Natural Resources and Environment and the Key
Laboratory of PlantNutrition and the Agri-environment in Northwest
China (Ministry of Agriculture),Northwest Agriculture &
Forestry University, Yangling, Shaanxi 712100,
China([email protected])
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http://www.world-agriculture.net/
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The State Key Laboratory of Soil Erosion and Dryland Farming on
the LoessPlateau, Institute of Soil and Water Conservation,
CAS&MWR, Northwest A&FUniversity, Yangling, Shaanxi
Province 712100, China
([email protected];[email protected])
Summary and Conclusions
China has been making a substantial contribution to global food
security by feeding22% of the world’s population with only 9% of
the world’s cultivated agriculturalland.
However, compared to agriculture in developed economies such as
USA, Australiaand the European Union, high grain yields in China
are associated with a large ruralpopulation, low per-household land
area, high consumption of chemical fertilizersand pesticides, as
well as relatively high labour and environmental costs.
Nevertheless, there is no simple solution to sustainably feeding
1.4 billion people,yet China is trying to ensure its own population
has access to clean, healthy andinexpensive food. We analyzed the
key factors that challenge sustainability ofagriculture in China,
including small and dispersed household land holdings,insufficient
agricultural workers, inadequate farmer education and
extensionprograms, excessive use of chemical fertilizers and
agro-chemicals, slow adoption ofadvanced agricultural technologies,
and an unbalanced supply-demand structure.
To sustain and modernise Chinese agriculture and to secure food
security andsafety while restoring environmental integrity and
social justice, the economic,scientific, political and
psychological practices should be combined and appliedefficiently
in China.
China has the bold aim to transform, modernise and sustain
Chinese agriculture byexpediting agricultural modernisation and
sustainability of production through aseries of practices. The
strategies include land consolidation (“tudi liuzhuan”) forbetter
management options (see section 3.1), educational programs to
improveagricultural knowledge and skills of farm practitioners (see
section 3.2), ecologically-sustainable agricultural practices
(Integrated Crop Management) to reduce use ofchemicals and improve
nutrient efficiency (see section 3.3), enhanced scientificresearch,
and enhanced extension services to bridge the technological
transfer gapbetween scientists, engineers and farmers (see section
3.4), government policyincentives and government investment (see
section 3.5) and technologicalimprovements and regional adaptive
practices (see section 3.6).
These strategies contribute to global food security,
environmental sustainability andpoverty elimination, and are
suitable for adoption by many Asian and sub-SaharanAfrica countries
in which over 75% of the population is engaged in
small-scalefarming. Scientists and engineers can make a big
difference at every step from fieldto consumption, but science and
technology alone cannot guarantee food security,as economic,
political and social issues also play key roles.
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Keywords: Land consolidation; food security; sustainable
agriculture; extension;agricultural workforce; education
China grows over 95% of its own grain ,to feed 22% of the global
population withonly 9% of the world’s cultivated agricultural land
[120 million hectares (Mha)],thereby contributing to global food
security .
Food production per capita in China has increased 3.5-fold
compared to 50 yearsago . While the planted area of cereals has
remained between 100 and 130 Mhasince 1949 and cereal production
has increased from 100 to over 650 million tonnes(Mt) (Figure
1).
The increased yields mainly result from: (1) the self-motivation
of farmers toincrease production, (2) reduced land rent (3)
economic reform and opening-up ofmarkets, (4) de-collectivization
of rural farmlands making individual householdsresponsible for an
area of cultivated land, and (5) from the late 1970s, the
adoptionof the high-yield crop cultivars of hybrid rice, maize, and
wheat , (6) increased use offertilizers and pesticides, and (7)
more investment in agricultural infrastructure suchas irrigation
and roads .
Population and per capita consumption are among the greatest
drivers for changein the environmental and agricultural sectors of
the economy . Solutions toenvironmental problems such as water and
air pollution, and soil erosion anddegradation have been associated
with greater grain production in manyindustrialized countries .
China faces similar challenges of food security,environmental
sustainability, and social justice.
The unique “dual track” structure of urban-rural development in
China hasaccelerated the development of urban areas and industrial
sectors at the expenseof rural development, and significantly
impeded agricultural development . Over40% of the Chinese
population live in rural areas with generally low
educationalattainment and vulnerability to poverty, poor health,
and market fluctuations.
Household agricultural land in China is in small tracts,
sometimes dispersed atvarious locations around the village/town
that makes mechanization and access tofacilities such as water for
irrigation difficult. In addition, urbanization andinfrastructure
for highway and railway construction is reducing the area of
arableland . Additionally, environmental projects such as the
“Grain for Green” projectthat is re-afforesting marginal and
steeply-sloping agricultural and pastoral landlimits arable land to
environmentally-stable locations reducing the area availablefor
agricultural production.Conversely,consumption patterns in China
are alsochanging to those more like developed counties with a
higher proportion of meatand dairy products, much of which is
grain-fed.
The increase in the proportion of animal products in the human
diet with theincrease in family incomes in China requires an
increase in the area of arable landor greater import of grains .
These issues pertain to the “san-nong” (i.e.,
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agriculture, countryside, and peasantry) and have now become the
priority foraction by the Chinese government. Practices have to be
implemented to transform,modernize and sustain Chinese
agriculture.
Our objective in this paper is to outline past and current
obstacles to improvedenvironmental and economic sustainability in
Chinese agriculture, identify currentpolicies that are being
implemented to remove these obstacles, and makerecommendations for
continued improvement.1.
1. Multiple tracts of small and dispersedareas of arable
land
In 2012 China had over 200 million farm households with an
average of 0.47 ha ofarable land in 5 to 7 tracts/fields (< 0.1
hectare per tract) per rural household .These small tracts of
arable land may consist of dryland or paddy fields, fertile
orless-fertile fields, and fields close to or far from farmers’
houses .
Compared to one big tract of arable land, the use of
agricultural machinery isdifficult and human and livestock power is
necessary, leading to increased costs ofgrain production per unit
area. In addition, the average area of agricultural land
perhousehold is much smaller in China compared to that in other
Asian or westerncountries (Table 1).
For example, the average area of farmland per household is
1.2-1.4 ha in SouthKorea and Japan, 18-69 ha in Western European
countries, 315 ha in Canada, 195 hain the USA , and 4330 ha in
Australia (Table 1).
About 44% of arable/cultivated land is irrigated in China,
mainly in southern China,and produces about 80% of the food
consumed . Northern China has 61% of thetotal arable land, but only
19% of the available water resources; this area ischaracterized by
rainfed (dryland) agriculture with low to moderate production .
1. 1. A large rural population but insufficientmotivation to
work or invest inagriculture
In 2015, the rural population of China accounted for 44% of the
total population(604 million out of a total population of 1,375
million ). The proportion of the ruralpopulation is decreasing
because of urbanization, but it may rebound because ofthe recent
replacement of the one-child policy with the two-child policy .
In China, agricultural workers are often pejoratively called
“peasants”, uneducated,ignorant, poor, dirty, and unfamiliar with
the more sophisticated mannerisms of theurban population.
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Because of the low social status of farming, the quality of the
working environment,and low economic returns, many farmers,
especially of the younger generations,prefer to prioritize income
from off-farm employment by working part- or full-timein factory-
or construction-jobs . In general there is little incentive to
invest inmachinery, year-round cropping, or soil management on the
small holdings .
Arable land is sometimes abandoned or left fallow for extensive
periods because oflabor shortage as able-bodied men are often
employed in distant factories. Therural-urban migration of labour
for economic benefits leaves the elderly, women,and children in the
rural areas, resulting in the hollowing-out of ruralcommunities ,
and the huge movement of the population around the country atthe
time of the Lunar New Year.
1. 1. Excessive use of chemical fertilizersand agro-chemicals
increasingenvironmental costs and decreasingfood safety
The idea of “more grain production coming from more
fertilization” rather thanincreased nutrient use efficiency (higher
conversion ratio of fertilizer to crop yield)has been widely
accepted among Chinese farmers, and fertilizer use has
nearlytripled since 1978 .
Today, China is the largest user of agricultural chemicals,
consuming around 35% ofworld’s fertilizers and pesticides for 22%
of the world’s population (Figure 2).Because of government
subsidies for chemical fertilizer and pesticides, the cost
tofarmers only accounts for a small proportion of the production
costs and results inoveruse.
For example, in 2016, total fertilizer application averaged
503.32 kg ha on arableland in China compared to the world average
of 140.55 kg ha according to theworld bank , while some apple
orchards receive as much as 5,000 kg ha offertilizer . Often, over
twice as much N and P fertilizer is applied as is recoveredfrom
harvested crops .
The surplus nutrients enter the environment and cause serious
environmentalissues, such as soil degradation and pollution ,
eutrophication of surface water,contamination of groundwater and
rivers , health risks for humans and animals ,and increased
greenhouse gas emissions (e.g., N O, NO and CO ) and
troposphericpollution .
1. 1. Daunting challenges for knowledgesharing and technology
transfer
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Obtaining good crop yields and simultaneously conserving the
soil and theenvironment are possible because of a large and growing
knowledge-base andongoing advances in technological capacity.
However, this knowledge and technological capacity are often
under-utilized inChina due to the low educational attainment of
farmers and inadequate agriculturalextension services, such that
farmers simply understand that more fertilizer meansmore yield and
potentially more income and are unaware of the asymptotic andeven
cubic nature of the input-output curve.
Chinese farmers receive less than 7.8 years of education on
average, over 70% donot have a high school diploma, less than 20%
have a senior high school diploma orhigher, and many are illiterate
. In contrast in the United States in 2014, only 15%of farm
operators did not have a high school diploma or equivalent, 30%
holdcollege or associate degrees, and 19% have achieved bachelor’s
degrees or higheraccording to an American Community Survey .
Education is one of the main driversin enhancing the ability of
farmers to adopt or purchase more advanced
agriculturaltechnologies, crop-management and business skills to
achieve higher rates of returnon land rather than just maximizing
grain yield.
However, the culture of turning to science for agronomic
solutions and toeconomists for business skills is not well
established. Often selection of crop speciesor cultivars is not
market/demand-driven, but from experience, word-of-mouth orfamily
tradition. In addition, the subsidies and price-support schemes
stimulatefarmers to maximize yield rather than to adopt sustainable
agricultural practices.
Therefore, ecological and environmental effects of farming are
not often consideredwhen making management decisions. For example,
farmers in Inner Mongolia,northern China, grow high water-use crops
such as rice along dry riverbeds,resulting in excessive pumping of
deep groundwater for irrigation . A similarproblem is also apparent
on the North China Plain where the water table has fallensteadily
over the past four decades due to pumping of water for intensive
croppingof wheat and maize .
The lack of awareness of environmental impacts, and the low
prices for electricityand water may also contribute to the overuse
of water for irrigation.
Advances in agricultural research and development have not been
matched byimprovements in agricultural extension services due to
lack of extensionprofessionals, effective extension models/methods,
and lack of scaling up ofresearch results to the level of the field
. Convincing small-holder farmers to adoptnew agricultural
technologies is more difficult than with farmers operating at
alarger scale .
1. 1. Unbalanced supply-demand structuresand uncompetitive
agricultural sectors
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To promote national food security and to maintain the growth of
farmers’ incomes,the Chinese government has adopted price
intervention policies (minimumprocurement prices) for maize, rice,
wheat, cotton and a range of othercommodities, that generate a
large price gap between domestic and internationalmarkets.
For example, the wholesale price of maize in China in 2016 was
50% higher thanthat of imported maize . Chinese markets have thus
been oversupplied with maizesince 2012/2013, while nearly 80% of
oilseeds have to be imported (e.g., soybeans~84 Mt in 2016 , mainly
from United States and Brazil ).
Additionally, market intervention policies such as import
tariffs are used to ensurethat no more than 5% of the requirements
for grain (excluding oilseeds) are metthrough imports. A minimum
price or government procurement raises grain pricesand farmers’
incomes, but at the same time sustains labour-intensive,
inefficientproduction, and decreases the competitiveness of Chinese
agriculture in the globalmarket.
It is also difficult for small-scale farming to integrate into
modern supply chains andmitigate the influences of market
volatility, climate change and other risks.1.
Some policy changes may help agriculture to become more
economically andenvironmentally sustainable while maintaining
social justice. These changes mayinclude social structure, market
intervention, agricultural science and technology,and policy.
1. Institutional innovation and policysupport for small-scale
farmingtransformation and land consolidation(“tudi liuzhuan”)
Agricultural land is collectively owned in China, but since 1978
smallholders havecontracted rights to free land-use for a period of
time, usually 30 years .
The No. 1 Policy Document published in 2013 announced the intent
“to inspire andsupport contracted land to be transferred to
specialized large-holders, family farmsand peasants’ cooperatives,
to facilitate certain scaling up of agriculture in variousforms” .
In 2016, policy documents officially announced a new farm-operation
rightthat enabled contracted farm land to be leased without
compromising contractedland-use rights (“sanquan fenli”).
This reform properly addresses issues related to the rights and
welfare of thetenants and existing resource users. Since 1998,
small-sized farms can beconsolidated to form mid- to large-scale
units through land transfer service centres
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based across the country or through rural shareholding
cooperatives (RSCs) . Thishas resulted in an increase in
large-scale farming operations in many regions ofChina .
About one third (~30.6 Mha) of household-contracted farmland was
transferred asof 2016 according to Ministry of Agriculture of China
compared to 5% in 2005. Over3.5 million small parcels of land have
been consolidated for managementaccounting to give a total area of
23.3 million hectares (19.4 % of the total) ofconsolidated land
with field sizes of 3.3 ha on average.
Zhejiang province in the eastern, coastal region of China has
been the pioneer forland transfer in China with nearly half of
rural household agricultural land pooledfor leasing as of 2016 .
Other practices such as programs of urbanization , andbuilding new,
rural infrastructure has also facilitated farm upscaling by
allocatingthe dispersed households to a centralized community and
physically connecting thedispersed land holdings.
Farming operations at larger scale facilitate the adoption of
uniform practices,technology and mechanization, and reduce costs.
For example, labour costs accountfor up to 51% of the total cost of
cotton production in Xinjiang AutonomousRegion , but mechanization
largely reduces the effects of labour shortages,decreases labour
costs, decreases the overall costs of production, and
therebyincreases profits ; this is also true for rice production
(Figure 3). Large-scalefarming operations in combination with
mechanization improve efficiency andagricultural competitiveness in
the global market, facilitate government regulationof food quality
and safety for consumers, and are also the prerequisites
forprecision agriculture and contract farming .
However, perverse economic incentives, high land rent, and land
tenure lawsimposed by governments that reward professional farmers
exploiting the land forshort-term profits such as growing cash
crops , may result in many cereal fieldsbeing converted to cash
crops or other profit-driven uses and threaten foodsecurity.
In addition, there have been substantial increases in the number
of companies andindividuals leasing large tracts of farmland in
rural China. This external investmentin agriculture may bring major
benefits in crop production and processing, but it isimportant that
the rights and welfare of the existing resource users and tenants
areproperly addressed . Therefore, comprehensive and appropriate
land-use planningand legal restrictions on changes to land use
should be strictly applied.
Instead of subcontracting farmland out, many agricultural
cooperatives known asfarmer professional cooperatives (FPCs) or
farmers’ specialized cooperatives havebeen intensively promoted
with the aim of increasing the economic welfare ofsmallholder
farmers in developing countries.
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A FPC is a local autonomous organization or collective organized
and managed byvoluntary farm operators/villagers/shareholders or by
village authorities. The FPCsvary in number of members, operating
strategies and types of agricultural products.
Although FPCs were established to help smallholder farmers take
advantage ofmarketing opportunities (e.g., bargaining power,
transaction costs, agri-food safetyand quality standards) , recent
studies have shown mixed outcomes of the FPCs.
Some studies have reported positive and
statistically-significant impact of FPCs onyields, net farm
returns, and household income , while many studies haveshown
insignificant improvement in household welfare by the FPCs compared
tonon-participants . It seems that the effective FPCs are mostly
associated withproduction of higher value cash crops, fruits and
animal breeding.
1. 1. Change of farming from a means oflivelihood to a
profession
The quantity and quality of employees largely determines the
success of anindustry, including agriculture.
Farmers need to be adequately trained before running large-scale
farms. In additionto the 9-year compulsory education and improved
education resources in ruralschools, many hands-on training
programs have been developed across the countryto educate farmers
with the necessary farming technologies and
market/businessskills.
For example, programs at the Northwest Agriculture &
Forestry University (NWAFU)in Yangling, China, have trained
thousands of agricultural technologists, farmersreturning to rural
areas after working in the city, and college students to
beprofessional farm operators.
Farmers attending these professional training programs are
screened for a specifiededucation threshold and therefore are
better educated than that of traditionalsmallholder farmers in
China . However, the training programs are often short-term (e.g.,
< 3 ~ 6 months) and farmers will be left behind unless they
participate incontinuing education to keep up with advancing
science and technology inagriculture.
Most participants in the training programs are open-minded and
enthusiastic aboutagriculture and are willing to adapt to
economic/market orientated agriculture andadopt new technologies to
increase profitability . It should be acknowledged thatthese
training programs are still in the early stages of development and
couldbenefit from access to well-developed programs in western
countries.
For example, the training and development program for beginning
farmers in theUnited States of America addresses the critical needs
of new farmers/ranchers withlocal and regional training, education,
outreach, and technical skills required tooperate a farm .
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1. 1. Enhanced scientific research andextension services in
agriculturesectors
The Chinese government has been increasing research funding in
many areasincluding agriculture and environment .
Higher education programs in agriculture at universities and
research institutions atnational and provincial levels generally
have the infrastructure and faculty membersto regularly produce
high quality graduates and postgraduates.
To support knowledge and technology transfer since the 1990s the
Chinesegovernment has funded over 12,000 research demonstrations
nationwide for crop-and soil-management practices (e.g., amount and
timing of crop demands on water,nutrients, solar energy, soil
properties, planting dates and density, precisionagriculture , and
reduced fertilizer use to economically-optimal levels
whilemaintaining yields) .
University faculties and student-based extension programs
developed by the ChinaAgriculture University (CAU) and NWAFU have
assisted with knowledge andtechnology transfer to local farmers for
increased agricultural production .
For instance, the “Science and Technology Backyard Platform”
initiated by CAU hasagricultural scientists living in the villages,
while the NWAFU program usesagricultural scientists from the
university, extension technologists from government,local
experienced farmers, and agricultural companies to advance
participatoryinnovation and technology transfer in support of
farmers.
These extension programs, together with demonstration plots,
create pathways forcommunication among farmers, farming educators,
and researchers, and also allowfarmers to make more informed
decisions about trade-offs, risks and livelihoodstrategies , but
scale-up is still an issue. In addition, the government
hasreactivated the nation-wide agricultural extension service and
seed-fertilizer-distribution agencies network (over 126,000
township-based agencies with over850,000 agency officers in 2007),
but the science and technology skills of the localextension
professionals should also be updated so as to better serve
farmers.
Recent reforms in scientific research and development funding
from the Ministry ofScience and Technology of China place equal
importance on extension of theresearch as well as the research
itself, which was not a requirement in the past.
1. 1. Transformation to ecologically-sustainable agricultural
practices
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Management practices that result in cycled nutrients (i.e., from
soil to crop tolivestock and back to agricultural soil as animal
manure) are required to reduce theneed for fertilizers, but care is
required in order to maintain food safety and preventthe occurrence
and spread of livestock pathogens to humans from the use ofanimal
manures.
Integrated pest management practices, including greater use of
natural enemies(biological control), crop diversity, and
biotechnology to better control croppathogens and pests are also
needed .
In 2012, the government invested CNY 1.5 billion (~USD 220
million in 2018) for soiltesting services to improve the timing and
amount of fertilizer applications , whilein 2015, China launched a
plan [CNY 2.5 billion (nearly USD 400 million in 2018) infunding]
to maintain present yields with zero-growth of chemical fertilizer
andpesticide use by 2020.
Because of overuse of fertilizers, “Less input, more output” can
be achieved byapplying results from experimental plots and farmers’
fields as demonstrated inTaihu and North China Plain regions where
yields were maintained with 30% to 60%less fertilizer application
by increased fertilizer-use efficiency . In manyindustrialized
countries such as the UK, grain yields have increased despite
reducedchemical use since the mid-1980s .
However, adoption of “Less input, more output” by farmers is
still slow because oftradition and the price-support schemes. The
reduced use of chemicals can reducepollution of soil , water and
air and decrease risks threatening human andanimal health .
Other strategies taken to produce more grain with lower
environmental costs andto enhance efficiency in time and energy
include zero or minimum tillage toincrease soil organic carbon and
reduce soil disturbance, integrated pestmanagement to lower
chemical use, water conservation strategies via mulching
andsupplemental irrigation ,and appropriate selection of fallow and
crop rotationpractices based on long-term studies . In 2016,
several programs and subsidieswere initiated to promote fallow and
crop rotation systems; starting with over 0.4Mha in the program in
2016, this doubled to 0.8 Mha in 2017, and aims to reach 3Mha (
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Large subsidy programs. China is running the largest
agricultural subsidy programin the world in terms of the total
budget . From the early 2000s, farmers have beensubsidized
according to the size of their holding because of concerns about
foodsecurity and farmers’ incomes .
Subsidies are available for purchase of productive and high
quality seed grain,animals, agricultural machinery, investment in
infrastructure such as farm-to-market road networks, commodity
markets, water storage and diversion channels,storage facilities,
marketing assistance and crop insurance. Although subsidyprograms
have played a significant role in improving farmer income,
associatedshortcomings such as the unbalanced supply-demand
structure and excessive useof chemicals have become apparent.
Poverty alleviation programs. The government has implemented a
set of actionsand plans to increase farmer income and alleviate
poverty, with the goal of doublingfarmer income between 2010-2020
.
Based on the 2010 poverty threshold of an annual income equal to
or less than CNY2300 or US$ 328 per capita (< US$ 1 day ), China
was the first developing country tomeet the UN Millennium
Development Goals to reduce poverty by half by the end of2017 to
around 3% or 30.5 million .
Further, the percentage of the population considered
malnourished fell from 24% in1992 to less than 10% in 2015 . These
achievements in China are based on the2010 poverty threshold of
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farmers’ fields) are to increase yields in farmers’ fields
and/or to attempt the moredifficult aim of increasing the
biophysical limits (yields constrained only by thebiophysical
resources of light, carbon dioxide and water) .
Many of the mechanisms for increasing grain yields in farmers’
fields have beenalready mentioned, but there are technological
advances that could now, or in thefuture, benefit farmers in China.
Improvements to enhance the efficient andeffective use of: (1)
water (e.g., water-saving agriculture using technologies such
asdrip irrigation or plastic-film mulch) and nutrients (e.g.,
micro-dosing or multiple-time dosing ), (2) new organic fertilizer
or manuring systems , and (3) “precisionagriculture” (technologies
that combine enhanced machinery, sensors, informationsystems, and
management practices to account for soil and plant variability
acrossthe fields to optimize productivity) .
Other technologies and soil health management options , such as:
(4) plantgrowth-promoting rhizobacteria (soil bacteria that
colonize the roots of plants andthat enhance plant growth following
inoculation of the seed) and (5) psychrotrophicmicrobiomes (able to
produce plant-growth promoting attributes includingammonia,
hydrogen cyanide, indole-3-acetic acid, and siderophores;
solubilizationof phosphorus, potassium, and zinc;
1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylate deaminaseactivity and (6)
biocontrol activity against plant pathogenic microbes) to
improveplant growth, soil quality and fertility, and also increase
yields and quality.
In addition, the ubiquitous mobile phone and well-developed
online business/e-commerce platforms address old agricultural
problems in new ways. They aretransforming people’s access to
market information and financial services by betterlinking farmers
to processors, retailers, consumers and the market both in Chinaand
overseas.
Biophysical limits can be increased through new breeding
technologies orgenetically-modified crops . Technologies such as
whole-genome sequencing,gene-editing and phenotyping platforms are
available to speed up the breeding ofnew crop cultivars with better
pest- and drought-resistance and higher yields.
Finally, because China is home to different climatic zones from
humid to arid, itmakes sense to implement different practices
according to local conditions. Forexample, 56% of China’s farmland
is not irrigated , mostly in north-west China,while excess water
for agriculture is available in areas of southern China.
Exploitingthe full potential of rainfed or dryland agriculture will
require targeted research andpolicy development for specific
regions .
Funding for this study was provided in part by the National Key
Research andDevelopment Program of China (No. 2017YFD0200205), the
National NaturalScience Foundation of China (No. 41501231 and
41877015), China PostdoctoralScience Foundation (2018M641024), the
Key Laboratory of Resource Biology andBiotechnology in Western
China (Northwest University, No. ZSK2017005), the West
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Light Foundation of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (for Yang
Liu), the State KeyLaboratory of Soil Erosion and Dryland Farming
on the Loess Plateau (A314021402-1913), and the 111 Project from
the Ministry of Education of China (No. B12007).
Special thanks go to Dr. John Richard Schrock for his valuable
comments. Anyopinions, findings and conclusions or recommendations
expressed in this materialare those of the authors and do not
necessarily reflect the views of the fundingagencies or
government.
Author Contributions: H.H., Y.L., B.S., M.D., N.T. and J. L.
wrote and commented onthe manuscript.
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Figures
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Figure 1. Agriculture in China: change of the planted area and
production of cereals from 1949 to2017 . Cereals include maize,
rice, wheat, barley, sorghum, buckwheat, oats, beans, and
potato.
Table 1. Average household farmland in selected
countries/regions
15
-
Figure2+ Total amounts of chemical fertilizer use (left) and
pesticide use (right) by the world(blue line) and by China (red
line) . The histograms give the annual amounts of nitrogen(blue),
phosphorus (yellow), potassium (red) and compound (green)
fertilizers used.
Figure 3. A comparison of farming practices in small-scale rice
farming (left, online source) andon a consolidated farm (right,
online source). The ridges between the paddy field parcelsare
theboundaries of rice paddies under different management. Many
laborers are required fortransplanting the seedlings raised in rice
nurseries, while large fields and mechanization are muchmore labour
efficient.
15,40
! 1902
" 22nd March 2019
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