Agricultural Technology and Equipment Improve Food Growth Potential in Cold Regions of China

In the past few days, Suyu Farm in Hulunbeier, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, was busy: three combine harvesters roared in the golden fields, and the tail of the locomotive evenly spewed the crushed wheat stalks. The car full of harvested wheat enters the wheat field.

Li Fei, head of the farm and animal husbandry, said: "The autumn harvest on the 20th is coming to an end. Although this year has suffered severe damage, we have the guarantee of technology and equipment. At present, the loss will not be great."

Suyu Farm is a sub-branch of the Hailaer Land Reclamation Group in Inner Mongolia. Between June and July this year, the Hailaer District suffered a hot and dry weather for a hundred years, and 450 million mu of wheat, barley, grains and rapeseed were affected to varying degrees.

In order to make up for the losses caused by natural disasters, the technical workers at Suyu farms and ranch have studied ways to solve the problem of running grain or food in the harvesting process of large-scale machinery. They regularly inspect the machinery and promptly overhaul the harvester's spillage.

"These woody rapeseed pods can't be missed. Barley and wheat will certainly not leak. In this way, grain granules can be guaranteed to return to the warehouse." Li Fei said.

In the yard of the wheat field, four grain trucks loaded with wheat went straight to the electronic floor scale (electronic scale) in front of the metering room window. In less than half a minute, a series of data such as variety, weight, and moisture content are displayed on the computer screen.

Li Fei said that since 2007, the management and standardization of farm yard management have been implemented to further ensure the quality of grain and oil harvesting.

The Hailar District is located between 48 and 50 degrees north latitude, and it is a typical high-cold area. However, in recent years, the local grain production has been rising.

In 2009, Hailar’s ​​total grain and oil output exceeded 750 million kilograms for the first time, a year-on-year increase of 19.7%, and an increase of 538 million kilograms or 70.5% over 2003. Wheat yields 336.5 kilograms per mu, 139.2 kilograms per mu per mu, and 287.2 kilograms per mu per barley, both of which set a record for alpine dry farming.

Fan Hongqi, chairman of Hailaer Land Reclamation Group Co., Ltd., said that these achievements have benefited from the company’s continuous improvement in agricultural technology and equipment levels since 2003. At present, the level of agricultural equipment in the entire reclamation region is close to that of developed countries and the level of comprehensive mechanization of field operations is 95%. The contribution rate of scientific and technological progress reached 71.38%.

In 2009, China announced plans to increase production by 100 billion kilograms of grain by 2020, and Inner Mongolia, which ranks 11th in total grain output, proposed a target of increasing production by 10 billion kilograms.

In 2008, total grain output in Inner Mongolia reached 21.3 billion kilograms, a record high. In the year of major drought in 2009, the grain output still reached nearly 20 billion kilograms. This year, Inner Mongolia launched a 10 billion-kilogram commodity grain production increase project, concentrating on creating the core grain-producing areas of Hetao, Tumochuan Plain and Nenjiang-Liaohe River Basin.

According to the person in charge of the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock in Inner Mongolia, in addition to expanding planting areas, Inner Mongolia will also adopt new technologies such as the promotion of plastic film cover cultivation, modeled high-yield cultivation, and soil testing and formula fertilization to ensure that high-quality and high-yield crop varieties cover more than 95%; The level of agricultural machinery and equipment, improve water conservancy facilities, transform low-yield fields, increase grain output, and reduce disaster losses.

“Although we suffered from this year's disaster, we are still confident that we will increase production by 1 billion kilograms of grain within 3 to 4 years,” said Fan Hongqi.