The demand for feed in China is 2.5 times the demand for rations.

In recent years, China's per capita food rations have dropped from 207.1 kg in 1986 to 148kg in 2010, a decrease of 28.5%, but at the same time, per capita food consumption such as meat, eggs and milk has been rising.

For more than 30 years, Ren Jizhou, an expert in grassland science and academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, has been making various efforts for the development of "grassland agriculture". He is worried about the situation of "attaching importance to cultivated land over grassland, focusing on grain and neglecting the development of grass industry." He said that the time has come to adjust the agricultural structure, and we can no longer hesitate to move forward. "if there is a big problem with agriculture, no one can save us!"

Lack of feed: a hidden worry in the supply of meat, eggs and milk

"since the 1980s, China's food structure has undergone a historic turning point. At present and for a long time in the future, the demand for food rations is about 200 million tons, and the demand for livestock feed is about 500 million tons." Ren Jizhou pointed out that our current understanding of food security is to protect arable land and have enough arable land to grow food. This way of thinking to increase grain production is too narrow. "the demand for feed is 2.5 times the demand for food rations. How can traditional arable land agriculture bear this heavy burden?"

In 2012, China imported 5.2 million tons of feed corn, 57.5 million tons of soybeans and 442000 tons of alfalfa licorice. What worries Ren even more is that because the price of corn is higher than that of wheat and the supply is not smooth, at present, most feed companies in China have switched to wheat instead of corn as formula feed. What kind of waste will this cause? With the same land and water resources, if you produce forage grass (including forage crops), you can harvest 3 to 5 times more energy and 4 to 8 times more protein than grain. Our country will be more than self-sufficient in food rations and feed.

According to Ren Jizhou's analysis, from the perspective of development trend, the current consumption of meat, eggs, milk and other food in China is only equivalent to the level of Japan in the 1960s, and the level of South Korea in the 1980s. With the growth of this consumption, China's feed gap will become larger and larger, and this gap needs to be filled by forage grass, including forage crops, not grain.

"this is a serious dislocation between the food production system and the food consumption system in the agro-ecosystem." Ren Jizhou pointed out that the problems caused by the contradiction of this system cannot be solved by minor technical measures, and it is necessary to adjust the agricultural structure.

Using "returning farmland to grassland" to ensure protein yield

As early as the early 1980s, Ren Jizhou put forward the viewpoint of developing grassland agriculture, but this obviously conflicts with the domestic mainstream concept of "taking grain as the key link" for a long time. Due to the lack of recognition from the decision-making departments, grassland agriculture has not been popularized in China.

For many years, due to the lack of thinking of overall development of agriculture, there have been a series of problems in agricultural areas, such as serious depletion of land resources, soil and water loss, water pollution, soil pollution, food pollution, rural poverty and so on. In grassland areas, from vegetation to soil, from livestock to wild animals, from herdsmen's life to animal husbandry society, there has been a systematic failure that has never existed in history.

Ren Jizhou said: attaching importance to grain production is no exception at all times and at home and abroad. However, food production must be included in the framework of the normal operation of the agricultural system, not isolated from the agricultural system, let alone above the agricultural system. "Food security is different from food security, arable land agriculture is not a reliable guarantee of food security." He called on no longer relying on chemical fertilizers and pesticides to increase grain production, but to transform "arable land agriculture" into "grassland agriculture." While protecting the red line of 1.8 billion mu of cultivated land, we should also take the road of "returning farmland to grassland" and give full play to the role of grassland outside cultivated land and grassland among forests. Reduce the use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides and reduce pollution.

He believes that "returning farmland to grassland" has better ecological benefits and faster benefits than "returning farmland to forest" in some areas. Therefore, we must introduce forage and herbivorous livestock into the agricultural system, unify the agricultural land of cultivated and non-cultivated land, and fully mobilize natural grassland, cultivated land and forestry. Implement the combination of grass and grain, grass and forest, grass and vegetable, grass and fruit, grass and cotton, and so on, through grass field rotation and other technologies, give full play to the production potential of all kinds of agricultural land and maintain ecological health.

He optimistically exemplified that in the development of grassland agriculture in China, its protein output will exceed the protein contained in imported soybean bean cakes, which alone can be equivalent to saving 300 million mu of arable land; and then using the total or semi-wasteland arable land caused by the outflow of rural labor can increase at least about 10% of the existing arable land.

How to take care of food and forage

In China's 9.6 million square kilometers of land, grassland is about 4 million square kilometers, accounting for 41 percent of the land area, more than three times the area of cultivated land. "in the development of agriculture in China, if we do not attach importance to the development of grass industry, it is obviously a waste of resources." Based on this, in July 2013, Ren Jizhou, together with eight academicians, submitted to the relevant departments a proposal on China's structural transformation from 'arable land agriculture' to 'food and forage', which was highly valued by national leaders.

Since then, the relevant decision-making departments have taken positive actions on the development of grass industry, dividing the domestic grassland and cultivated land into several regions and sub-regions, and each region has put forward some specific measures to recommend livestock raising, thus vigorously promoting grassland animal husbandry.

"however, the construction of modern grassland agriculture, which takes care of both grain and forage, is a systematic project that touches on the reform of the agricultural structure. I hope to establish a county-scale 'demonstration and experimental area of grassland agriculture' in every major region or sub-region, and carry out structural reform of traditional arable land agriculture in order to implement the spirit of the CPC Central Committee's' structural adjustment'." Ren Jizhou said.

Before the Spring Festival in 2014, General Secretary Xi Jinping inspected the grass industry in Inner Mongolia and fully affirmed the strategic position of China's grass industry in the adjustment of agricultural structure and the construction of ecological civilization.

However, Ren Jizhou is still worried about the situation that some competent departments and some local governments "focus on grain while neglecting the development of grass industry." this is a concept that has been formed for a long time, and it is difficult to change it immediately. The direct consequence is that the domestic grassland has suffered the greatest damage, and its severity has never appeared even in history. The area of the grassland has shrunk, the quality has deteriorated, and the whole ecosystem has also been seriously affected.

As one of the founders of modern grassland science in China, Ren Jizhou, who is nearly 90 years old, is also the first academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering in the field of grassland research. During the conversation, he recalled that before he went to work in Lanzhou in 1950, Wang Dong, the founder of China's grassland science, personally wrote a couplet as a gift: "set your mind for heaven and earth, build your life for the people, live with cattle and sheep, and travel with deer." Over the past 30 years, he was saddened to see the grassland declining, but there was nothing he could do about it.

"to save the nation from water and fire is related to the safety of the country." Ren Jizhou said that he always put his mentor's encouragement in the bottom of his heart and dared not forget it for a moment. Hope that through their own and more grassland science and technology personnel, agricultural science and technology personnel and more people of insight together to appeal to further promote the cause of modern grassland agriculture.