There are hidden worries behind the ten-year harvest of summer grain, relying on fertilizer to increase production and deteriorate the quality of cultivated land.

Hidden worries behind Ten Lianfeng of Summer Grain

According to the official website of the National Bureau of Statistics, in 2013, the total output of summer grain reached 131.89 million tons, an increase of 1.96 million tons or 1.5 percent over 2012, of which the output of winter wheat was 115.67 million tons, an increase of 1.48 million tons or 1.3 percent over the previous year. In 2013, the total output of summer grain in China exceeded the best level in history, achieving "ten consecutive harvests".

In the past ten years, due to the attention of the central government and effective policies, "increasing production" and "high yield" have become the key words of agriculture. However, with the improvement of living standards and changes in the diet structure of our residents, the supply and demand of grain and other agricultural products has always been in a tight balance, food security still can not be taken lightly.

According to statistics from the General Administration of Customs, China's grain imports soared 156 per cent in 2012 from the previous year to 13.98 million tons, accounting for about 5 per cent of international trade. Among them, corn imports nearly tripled, net rice imports more than tripled, and wheat imports nearly doubled.

Of course, compared with China's annual grain consumption of 520 million tons, the proportion of imports is not high, at 2.7%, indicating that China's food supply is still at a safe level, but it is such a huge consumption that it has brought long-term and tremendous pressure on China's agricultural production.

Dang Guoying, a researcher at the Rural Institute of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told reporters that at present, the grain output of cultivated land in China is just enough, and in order to achieve stable and high yield, when there is no crop rotation rest, in the long run, the fertility of cultivated land will be worrying.

According to agricultural experts, crop yield depends on two factors, one is basic soil fertility, and the other is water and fertilizer management. In the agricultural output of foreign countries, the contribution rate of basic soil fertility (soil fertility) can reach about 70%, while the average contribution rate of our country is only about 50%. The situation of barren land in China can be seen.

Farmers who farm every day have more personal experience of this. They said, how fertile the land used to be, and the ploughed soil was so dark that it seemed to produce oil. Where can we find such a land now? The more the land is planted, the more yellow it is, and the more it is planted, the thinner it is.

If the land is insufficient, it will be made up by fertility. As a result, we can see that every spring ploughing season, the chemical fertilizers in various agricultural markets are piled up like hills. Statistics show that China's arable land is less than 10% of the world's, but it uses more chemical fertilizers than 1x3 in the world. Excessive fertilization seems to keep the yield, but it further deteriorates the quality of cultivated land, which is not sustainable after all.

Grass-roots agricultural experts told reporters that ten years ago, the input-output ratio of fertilizer and grain in some places was 1:5, that is, fertilizer input of 1 yuan could increase grain production by 5 yuan. But now it has fallen to 1:1 or even lower. This shows that agricultural production no longer increases linearly because of the increase in the use of chemical fertilizers, and the way to increase production by relying solely on chemical fertilizers is getting narrower and narrower.

This is not only the case with cultivated land resources, but also the bottleneck of water resources. In the North China Plain and other places, due to the over-exploitation of groundwater, many groundwater funnel areas have been formed. It is more and more difficult for farmers to drill wells for irrigation, and the cost is getting higher and higher.

With the process of urbanization and industrialization and the pressure of "increasing production" and "bumper harvest", the situation of resources and environment faced by China's agricultural production will only become more severe, while the agricultural subsidy policy that has been implemented for many years, its effect of encouraging farmers' production is weakening.

In recent years, when it comes to the good situation of agricultural production, the first reason is various agricultural subsidies. Since 2004, China has successively introduced and improved policies such as direct subsidies for grain farmers, subsidies for improved varieties, subsidies for the purchase of agricultural machinery and tools, and comprehensive subsidies for agricultural materials, which have greatly aroused the enthusiasm of farmers in production. it has played a vital role in continuously increasing grain production in our country.

However, with the rapid rise in the prices of inputs such as agricultural materials and the wages of farmers going out to work, even if agricultural subsidies increase every year, the proportion of farmers' income and production costs still shows a "double downward" trend, and the mobilization effect on farmers' enthusiasm for growing grain and increasing grain production is not as obvious as when the policy was first introduced.

In addition, due to the current frequent land transfer, many farmers who actually cultivate the land can not get subsidies, and the subsidies have become income-based benefits enjoyed by farmers based on contracted land. This in turn reduces the original intention of the policy to stimulate production.

The above signs show that although China's grain has achieved "nine consecutive increases" and summer grain followed by "ten consecutive harvests", the foundation of agricultural production is still weak, and even shows more hidden worries due to continuous production in some aspects. Some long-term measures to increase production are facing tests, and there is an urgent need for a fundamental change in the mode of agricultural production.

First, we should rely on scientific and technological progress and the improvement of farmland infrastructure to increase production. Compared with developed countries, the contribution rate of agricultural science and technology in China still differs by about 20 percentage points, and the situation that agricultural development depends on the consumption of soil and water resources and relying on nature for food needs to be changed as soon as possible; at the same time, about 70% of China's farmland is still medium-and low-yield fields, and the per unit yield can be increased by more than 20% through transformation.

Second, we should build a new agricultural management system to increase the vitality of agricultural development. Agricultural modernization is not only the modernization of material conditions, infrastructure and scientific and technological level, but also the modernization of the main body of agricultural production, organizational structure, mode of operation and so on. Only by continuously strengthening and improving the supporting policies of agriculture in accordance with the requirements of building a new agricultural management system, can we continuously mobilize the enthusiasm of agricultural production and increase the vitality of agricultural development. (reporter Gao Yuanzhi)

News link

According to the official website of the National Bureau of Statistics, in 2013, the total output of summer grain reached 131.89 million tons, an increase of 1.96 million tons or 1.5 percent over 2012, of which the output of winter wheat was 115.67 million tons, an increase of 1.48 million tons or 1.3 percent over the previous year.

The sown area is basically the same as the previous year. In 2013, the sown area of summer grain was 27.588 million hectares, basically the same as in 2012, while the sown area of winter wheat was 22.44 million hectares, a decrease of 45000 hectares or 0.2 percent over the previous year. The sown area of 11 major summer grain producing provinces (regions) 1 increased by 41000 hectares, of which Jiangsu, Anhui, Shandong, Henan, Hubei and Xinjiang provinces (regions) increased by 179000 hectares, mainly due to the reduction of cotton, oil and wheat. Hebei, Shanxi, Sichuan, Shaanxi and Gansu provinces decreased by 138000 hectares.

The level of per unit yield has been improved. In 2013, the per unit yield of summer grain reached 4781 kg / ha, an increase of 71 kg / ha or 1.5% over the previous year, of which the per unit yield of winter wheat reached 5154 kg / ha, an increase of 76 kg / ha or 1.5% over the previous year.

Most of the main producing areas have increased production. Of the 11 main summer grain producing provinces (regions), 7 increased production and 4 reduced production. Among the provinces (regions) that increased production, Hubei increased by 540000 tons, Jiangsu by 520000 tons, Hebei and Henan by 490000 tons each, Xinjiang by 470000 tons, Shandong by 400000 tons and Anhui by 370000 tons, totaling 3.28 million tons. Shaanxi reduced production by 490000 tons, Gansu by 420000 tons, Shanxi by 290000 tons and Sichuan by 120, 000 tons, totaling 1.32 million tons.

In the non-major producing provinces (cities and regions), except for Beijing, Shanghai, Chongqing, Yunnan and Ningxia, the output of other areas has increased to varying degrees.

The yield of summer miscellaneous grains increased significantly. The sown area of miscellaneous grains in summer in 2013 reached 5.149 million hectares, an increase of 45000 hectares or 0.9 percent over 2012, and the output of summer grains reached 16.22 million tons, an increase of 470000 tons or 3.1 percent over 2012. The increase in the yield of miscellaneous grains accounts for about 1/4 of the increase in summer grain production. In particular, the southwest region and Guangxi made use of winter fallow fields to expand the sown area of potato by 57000 hectares and increase the yield by nearly 340000 tons.

The effect of supporting policy is obvious. In order to ensure grain production, the central government promptly allocated direct subsidies for grain for 2013, which were distributed to farmers at the first time. For the production of summer grain, the central government allocated 1.7 billion subsidy funds for "one spray and three prevention" (prevention of diseases and pests, dry and hot wind, and lodging) in the later stage of winter wheat, so as to achieve full coverage of wheat "one spray and three prevention"; in addition, 800 million yuan was allocated for the prevention and control of diseases and insect pests, of which 150 million yuan was allocated for the prevention and control of 1 million hectares of wheat with heavy diseases and insect pests at the seedling stage, which played a very obvious role in increasing summer grain production.

The climatic conditions in most of the main producing provinces are normal. During the sowing period in autumn and winter last year, the soil moisture in most of the winter wheat areas in China was better, the emergence of wheat was good, and the seedlings were all complete. In the northern wheat region, the temperature dropped slowly after the beginning of winter, the cold resistance of wheat was fully exercised, and the strong seedlings overwintered; after the beginning of spring, the temperature rose gently, the wheat had full tillers, and the number of tillers increased in varying degrees compared with previous years; the temperature has risen rapidly since May, which is beneficial to the dry matter accumulation of wheat. In the southern wheat region of Hubei and the middle and south of Jiangsu and Anhui, the match of light, temperature and water is obviously better than that of the whole year, which is very beneficial to the yield increase of wheat.

Wheat diseases and insect pests occur less frequently. The main diseases and insect pests affecting the growth of wheat are generally light this year. According to statistics from relevant departments, the cumulative occurrence area of wheat scab, stripe rust, aphids and wheat spiders decreased by 85.2%, 51.7%, 22.3% and 9.6% respectively in 2013 compared with the previous year. The cumulative occurrence area of midges decreased by 13.2 percent, and the cumulative occurrence area of sheath blight was the same as the previous year.

Production has been reduced in some areas due to the disaster. In southwest, northwest (except Xinjiang) and Shanxi, the precipitation during the summer grain growing period is generally 30-40% less than that in normal years, and more than 50% in some areas, resulting in a large reduction in dryland wheat yield. Shanxi's per unit yield has dropped by nearly 10%, Gansu by nearly 9%, and Yunnan and Shaanxi by nearly 8%. However, due to the small proportion of these areas in the whole country, it does not affect the trend of increasing production in the whole country.

Northwestern Jiangsu, northeastern Anhui, eastern and southern Henan, and southwestern Shandong were affected by frost injury in April and lodging caused by heavy rainfall at the end of May.

The 111 major producing provinces (regions) include Hebei, Shanxi, Jiangsu, Anhui, Shandong, Henan, Hubei, Sichuan, Shaanxi, Gansu and Xinjiang.