The nutrient return rate of livestock and poultry manure in China is less than 50%.

Zhang Taolin, vice minister of agriculture, said on the 23rd that due to the heavy use of chemical fertilizers and insufficient investment in environmental protection in rural areas, composting is becoming increasingly scarce in rural areas. At present, the nutrient return rate of livestock and poultry manure in China is less than 50%.

Zhang Taolin said at the 2015 International composting Conference and the 10th National Symposium on composting Technology and Engineering held here that composting technology is a key technology for the comprehensive utilization of agricultural wastes and plays an important role in improving the utilization rate of agricultural resources. it plays an important role in improving the quality of ecological environment and realizing circular agriculture and sustainable development. Composting was still widely carried out in rural areas in the 1950s and 1970s, and organic wastes such as human and animal manure, crop straw and even weeds had to be composted and returned to the field. However, over the past 30 years, due to the extensive use of chemical fertilizers, insufficient investment in rural environmental protection, and the transfer and structural shortage of rural labor force, compost has become increasingly scarce in rural areas, so that the nutrient return rate of livestock and poultry manure in China has been less than 50%. The degradation of cultivated land such as the decline of soil organic matter and fertility in some areas has become increasingly prominent.

As for how to give full play to the role of composting technology in realizing recycling and sustainable development of agriculture in the future, Zhang Taolin said that it is necessary to learn from international experience and practices, based on China's national conditions, and give better play to composting technology in agricultural cleaner production, especially the irreplaceable role of agricultural energy conservation and emission reduction, low-carbon agriculture and rural environment construction.

This conference, sponsored by China Agricultural University and China composting Network, is the first international composting conference held in China.