China's 30 million mu coastal beach will become a backup granary.

At present, it is the last days of rice harvest. At Shuntai Farm in Sheyang County, Yancheng City, Jiangsu Province, on the coast of the Yellow Sea, the originally abandoned salt farm has become 10,000 mu of rice fields, with a salt content of more than 3 ‰, with a maximum of 8 ‰. There are only wild salt-tolerant plants such as Suaeda salsa, Reed and Mitsubishi grass on the ridge.

The existing coastal beach area in China is 35.18 million mu.

Academician Zhu Ying and Chen Wenfu led more than 20 experts to measure the yield of some varieties on the spot. The yields of "Nanjing 9108" and "Yandao 12" were as high as 617.8 kg and 612.8 kg per mu, respectively.

The existing coastal tidal flat area in China is 35.18 million mu, of which 10.31 million mu in Jiangsu Province, which is silted up at a rate of about 30, 000 mu every year. Among them, there are more than 3 million mu of beaches suitable for growing rice in Jiangsu, which is equivalent to 10% of the rice planting area of the province. In the past, it could only be used for salt drying and fish farming.

Wang Cailin, a famous rice breeding expert and researcher of Jiangsu Academy of Agricultural Sciences, analyzed that the special water environment formed by salt-tolerant rice cultivation also has ecological effects such as leaching pressure salt reduction and balancing soil fertility, which is conducive to the sustainable improvement of saline-alkali soil. Moreover, rice is very suitable for mechanized seed harvesting and large-scale management, which coincides with the characteristics of sparsely populated coastal tidal flat and labor shortage.

In recent years, domestic colleges and universities have cultivated a number of new salt-tolerant rice varieties. Hainan University cooperated with Hunan Rice Research Institute to cultivate many rice lines with salt tolerance, such as Haixiang 030, Haixiang 016, Haixiang 121 and so on. New salt-tolerant, high-quality and high-yield rice varieties NY047-1, NY48-3 and NY55-6 were bred by the Grain crops Research Institute of Jiangsu Academy of Agricultural Sciences. The rice quality reached the third grade of the national standard when the salt concentration was more than 3 ‰. Yancheng 156, a medium indica rice variety successively bred by Jiangsu Coastal Agricultural Science Institute, has been popularized and planted in more than 6 million mu in Jiangsu coastal rice areas.

Experts believe that China should attach importance to and strengthen the research on breeding and cultivation techniques of salt-tolerant rice varieties so as to expand the area of fine cultivated land. It is suggested that the relevant national and local departments should set up projects to support and speed up the development and utilization.