Peking (ots/PRNewswire) – Chen Qingshan and his team have an urgent priority: to accelerate the breeding of new soybean varieties to increase production capacity and help China secure soy self-sufficiency.
“The soybean is a pain point for the country,” said Chen, a soybean breeding expert and researcher at Northeast Agricultural University, a top agricultural university in China’s top soybean production base – northeast China’s Heilongjiang Province.
Chen said his team’s research focuses on breakthroughs in soybean germplasm to accelerate domestic production of soybeans and reduce dependence on imports. This objective has become more important given increasing geopolitical tensions, including the ongoing Ukraine crisis.
As tiny and insignificant as they may seem, seeds are the “chip” of agriculture. And germplasm, i.e. living genetic resources, are the basis of seed breeding.
Chinese President Xi Jinping said in July 2021 that germplasm security should be elevated to the strategic level of national security.
Such a holistic approach to national security can be well understood through an ancient piece of Chinese philosophy: “The dynamism of the world flourishes or declines; the state of the world either advances or declines.”
With this phrase and the associated classical wisdom, Xi underscored the importance of being prepared for potential challenges, risks and dangers and taking the initiative to overcome them.
“The tides of the world flow or ebb; the state of a state thrives or fails.”
The Chinese proverb, which dates back to Lyu Zuqian, a Confucian scholar of the Southern Song Dynasty (1127-1279), states that even in times of calm and peace, a country always must be vigilant and prepared for possible dangers.
The Chinese leadership has long attached great importance to this philosophy of governance. For President Xi, food security is one of the country’s most important interests. China has to feed almost a fifth of the world’s population with around 9 percent of the world’s arable land.
Although China has increased production of high-quality soybeans and imports have fallen, the sector remains a weak link in food security efforts. In 2021, imported soybeans covered more than 85 percent of the country’s total needs.
Chen, the soybean researcher, said the country’s goal is to increase production of the crop by 50 percent in the next three to five years.
Then soybean production will increase by 10 million tons per year, about a tenth of the amount the country imports, he said.
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