Green Growth Driven by New Technology - Qingdao Promoting the "Grain Technology" Through Scientific and Technological Innovation

"Ensuring food security is an eternal topic, and we can't undervalue it at any time."

Qingdao is a coastal city in Shandong Province in China. It is an industrial city, but more importantly, it is an agricultural city and undertakes the important task of national food security. In recent years, Qingdao has conscientiously implemented the important instructions of General Secretary Xi Jinping's, strengthened science and technology, promoted development through innovation, and achieved the "green growth" of grains. Therefore, Qingdao City has successfully provided the Qingdao model for ensuring the national food security, solving the structural shortage of labor forces in agriculture, and realizing the agricultural transformation.

The way of irrigation and fertilization are reformed. The integration of water and fertilizer is adopted to break the bottleneck of water resource constraints and transforms the grain development into a green and quality one.

On June 22, 2020, Wang Zhitao, the owner of Yihe Family Farm in in Jiangshan Town, Laixi County-level City, Qingdao City, Shandong Province, took a bunch of wheat ears from his field satisfactorily. The highest wheat yield reached 806.02 kg per mu in his farm, marking the first time that the wheat yield has exceeded the 800 kg in Laixi County. The secret lies in the drip irrigation tapes laid in the wheat field.

In Qingdao's grain fields, there is a water pipe lying on the ground, which is connected to small black pipes. This is a fully mechanized wheat-corn drip fertigation technology mode: It has changed the traditional irrigation and fertilization methods such as inundation, check irrigation and pipe irrigation. It can save more than 30% water, more than 20% fertilizer and more than 15% pesticide per unit area. Also, it increases irrigation efficiency by more than 10 times, land use efficiency by more than 10% and production by more than 10%.Water is the lifeblood of agriculture. Qingdao City is a region with extremely inadequate water resources. In Qingdao City, the water resources per capita is 247 cubic meters, which is only 11% of the national average and less than 3% of the world average. The lack of water resources has long restricted the improvement of grain production capacity. However, the traditional grain production mode of "large-scale water and excessive fertilizer" has led to excessive consumption of resources and unsustainability. Qingdao municipal government already has clear awareness of this situation. Since 2001, the agricultural and rural affairs authority of Qingdao City has gathered the forces of universities, scientific researches, extension and R&D enterprises to carry out collaborative research on high-efficiency water-saving technology. After 10 years of exploration and innovation, the new grain production mode based on fertigation has been gradually improved. The quantification and mechanization of harvest and other key operation links, such as planting, fertilization, irrigation, and harvesting, have effectively solved the bottleneck of water resource constraints, and dealt with fertilizer application difficulty in wheat and corn growth in the middle and later stages. This fertigation technology has been listed as a leading resource-saving and environment-friendly food technology by the Qingdao Agricultural and Rural Affairs Bureau. At present, this fertigation technology has been applied from the "pilot field" to "large-scale field". More than 100 demonstration bases have been built in Qingdao City, and the promotion and application technology has increased to more than 100,000 mu of land.

From 2018 to 2020, Qingdao City has achieved a super high yield level of more than 800 kg in different plots and for different varieties for three consecutive years. In 2020, the highest actual yield of corn has reached 1,021.25kg per mu of land, driving the average yield per unit area of autumn grain to a record high and become a model of the whole Shandong Province.

The transformation and upgrading of agricultural machinery and equipment have been accelerated to create a new model of unmanned farms with intelligent agricultural machinery, break the bottleneck of agricultural labor shortage, and promote the transition from the traditional agriculture to smart agriculture.

In the busy season of 2020, a large farm looked deserted in Pingdu County-level City in Qingdao City, Shandong Province. Only a few red driverless vehicles were still working. These driverless vehicles have been put into use recently on the farm. They are all unmanned and can undertake various tasks, including farming, weeding, spraying pesticide and harvesting. Yin Bende is the person in charge of the farm. After using unmanned equipment, he has more free time.

This is an intelligent unmanned farm built in Qingdao City. Farmers can master the operation of the farm with just one computer in the office. Through the cloud platform, remote instructions can be given to the driverless vehicle in the field. Driverless vehicles do farm work in the countryside. The farm realizes the whole process management of farmland, complete more than 70% of the work in the farm, observe the real-time position of vehicles and the growth of crops through the platform at any time, and take videos and photos. In addition, the farm can also store all the operation data in the database, realize the traceability of various processes of agricultural products, and provide accurate technical data for various aspects of agricultural production.During the "13th Five-Year Plan", Qingdao's agricultural machinery and equipment have been upgraded. New technologies such as big data, cloud computing, Internet technology, and satellite navigation have been widely applied to agriculture and agricultural machinery, which promotes the innovation and development of smart agriculture and intelligent agricultural machinery. The comprehensive mechanization rate of the cultivation and harvesting of the main crops in Qingdao City has reached 89%. In addition, the comprehensive mechanized production system for major crops, such as corn and wheat, has been established. The entire mechanized production system for bulk cash crops has been basically established; unmanned agricultural technology systems such as plant protection drones and Beidou terminal agricultural machinery have begun to be established. Pingdu, Laixi, Jiaozhou, Jimo, and Huangdao Counties (County-level Cities) become the first demonstration counties for the mechanization of major crop production in China. Qingdao City of Shandong Province has become one of the first demonstration cities to basically realize the whole mechanization of major crop production in China, and is constantly promoting the transformation of traditional agriculture to the precise and intelligent agriculture.

Innovation should be made in straw utilization to create a new technology of biological multi-effect composting, help utilize crop straw resources, and explore a new way to improve the land fertility of land.In the wheat planting season in the autumn of 2020, a pile of dark brown biological compost was emitting the fragrance of soil in the field after corn harvest in Yifengdian Town, Jimo District, Qingdao City. Two shovel trucks are busy. Four fertilizer spreading locomotives were arranged in line and started to move gradually. The fertilizer outlet was opened, and the high-quality compost spurted out. People were well prepared for the harvest for the winter wheat.

The compost is a new type of biological multi effect compost produced by microbial fermentation technology using crop straw, vegetable waste and other agricultural organic wastes. Since 2019, the pilot project has been carried out in Jimo District, and more than 60,000 square meters (30,000 mu) have been used as demonstration sites. The cost of organic fertilizer used by farmers has been reduced from 800 yuan/mu to 200 yuan /mu, and the amount of used chemical fertilizer has been reduced by more than 15%. Soil acidification, salinization and other problems have been significantly improved. Furthermore, Jimo District has effectively solved the problem of resource utilization of crop straw, greatly alleviated the environmental pollution pressure of agricultural organic wastes, such as crop straw, vegetable wastes, livestock and poultry manure, turned waste into treasure, and explored a new way to improve the land fertility of grain fields.

"Clear river and lush mountains are valuable assets." In recent years, Qingdao City has utilized agricultural and animal husbandry organic waste to make breakthroughs, adhered to the technological innovation and institutional mechanism innovation, formed the leading new technology mode with membrane mulching composting as the core, and successfully explored "agricultural product and livestock manure composting for large-scale cattle farm", "large-scale chicken and agricultural product composting", "vegetable waste + livestock manure composting" and "orchard waste composting" and other composting modes with different technical characteristics. Equipment support and technical support has been provided for the development of agricultural ecological cycle, transformed the use of agricultural waste resource to an automated, large-scale and standardized one, and created a new way of green, safe and high-quality development path of modern agriculture that can be replicated and promoted.

More efforts should be made to strengthen the breeding cooperation between research institutes and enterprises, cultivate new varieties with high yield, high quality and high resistance, and improve the grain yield and quality at the same time.Qingfeng Seed Co., Ltd. is a seed enterprise starting from township agricultural technology station in Pingdu County-level City, Qingdao City, Shandong Province. In 2019, Qingnong No. 6, Qingnong No. 7 and Qingnong No. 177 cultivated by the company passed the examination and approval of Shandong Province. Qingfeng Seed Co., Ltd. became one of the largest breeding entities together with Shandong Academy of Agricultural Sciences. Qingnong No. 1608 and Qingnong No. 1604, were also reviewed and approved by Shandong Province. These new varieties have not only high yield, but also high quality, strong disease resistance and wide adaptability. These new varieties have solved the difficulties in realizing the high yield, high quality, and multiple resistance capabilities at the same time. At present, the improved wheat varieties selected by the company are widely used in Shandong, Anhui and other provinces. More than 1 million mu is promoted in Qingdao City every year, accounting for about one third of the total wheat planting area in Qingdao City.

How can a township enterprise develop so rapidly in wheat breeding in a short period of time? This is mainly due to Qingdao's emphasis on seed industry technology innovation and development of platform to strengthen the cooperation between research institutes and enterprises in terms of crop breeding. In 2016, with the support of Qingdao Agricultural and Rural Affair Bureau, Qingfeng Seed Co., Ltd. and Zhao Zhendong, an academician of the Chinese Academy of engineering, established Qingdao's first agricultural science and technology academician workstation. Since then, the cooperation between science and enterprise in wheat breeding has developed rapidly.

In recent years, Qingdao City has increased the cultivation of new varieties and promoted industrial upgrading. Qingdao City plans to become an international seed capital with "one core, multiple breakthroughs, and global collaboration" and has already established cooperation with 30 seed enterprises with strong R&D and breeding capabilities. Qingdao City has made great efforts to create an innovation platform of "Qingdao modern seed industry alliance"; share resources, technology and achievements, and accelerate the integration between companies, universities, research institutes; promote breeding technologies; and has developed nearly 70 members. Qingdao City has innovated the variety evaluation and promotion mechanism, established a three-level variety evaluation and promotion system of "introduction test", "multi-site demonstration" and "safety evaluation", introduced and demonstrated more than 120 new varieties of crops each year, and organized more than 20 on-site visit activities of "field selection and helping farmers to increase income". Qingdao City has basically adopted various improved varieties of major crops, and improved grain yield and quality.