Boosting rural prosperity with sci-tech

Large-scale agriculture

As a major grain producer, Anhui has pledged to maintain its production capacity of around 70 billion kilograms each year, spanning arable land of no less than 5.82 million hectares, encouraging the local farmers to get rich through planting and producing grains, and making the province's grain sector stable and people's livelihoods better secured.

In Taihe county of Fuyang in northwestern Anhui, Xu Congxiang is an experienced wheat farmer.

Owning an 82-hectare agricultural science and technology park, which includes an R&D building and over 10 units of large mechanical equipment, his park produced 820,000 kg of wheat in 2022. He also has proprietary ownership of some 20 key technologies for planting high-yield wheat through scaled agricultural operations.

To increase its grain production, Anhui netted in a total yield of more than 83 billion kg of grain in 2023 by planting over 6.67 million hectares of the commodity.

One product per village

Anhui also aims at a new pattern of "a unique product for each village, and a unique industry for each county", with a driving force of "industries" as the core for development.

In Anqing's Qianshan county, the Anqing Forestry Bureau sent staff to aid farmers in Pingfeng village, helping them identify their potential unique products — in this case, sweet potatoes — and encouraging more than 40 residents from over 30 households to expand cultivation of the tubers.

In 2023, the village harvested 120,000 kg of small sweet potatoes and produced 20,000 kg of sweet potato flour, leading to an income of 300,000 yuan for the village.

Each household in the village could increase their annual income by over 5,000 yuan, the bureau said, adding that the village is now thinking of an enlarged mode of "online livestreaming promotion + offline sales" to bolster the popularity and sales of small sweet potatoes.

Meanwhile, with over 61 million people living in 104 county-level areas administering various townships and villages, Anhui is also trying to form a mode of "one specialty for each county."

Funan county, with 1.74 million residents in southern Fuyang, is encouraging farmers in its 28 towns to develop wicker products interwoven with cattail, willow and mulberry strips, expanding its fame as "the capital of China's wickerwork".

Located along the Huaihe River, the county has abundant resources, and in Yangzhai village under Huanggang town, households running wickerwork businesses can each earn up to 60,000 yuan annually from handicrafts.

Currently, Funan can produce over 10,000 wickerwork varieties, which are of both ornamental and practical value, and are sold both at home and abroad, said its publicity chief Zhang Lei.

Tong said that the ultimate path to rural prosperity is to rely on science and technology, and his college routinely sends a team of teachers with PhDs to help cultivate professional breeders and high-quality farmers in Taihu county.

He added that the further progress of both Zhou's and Zhao's businesses has demonstrated the power of science and technology.

Citing Xinrui Rice Industry Co Ltd as an example, Tong said the firm operates a 180-hectare rice paddy, adopting mechanized farming, drone seeding and pesticide spraying.

In addition to offering technical help for Qinyou Biotechnology, Li Ting from the AVTC School of Modern Business also helps farmers in Changlin with e-commerce skills in livestreaming their mountain produce.

The village, located in the hard-to-reach Dabie Mountains, has many types of mountain produce to publicize, and science and technology can offer a helping hand, she said.

Wang Xiping, secretary of the CPC committee in Mituo town, said AVTC not only sends experts and professors to the town for technical guidance, but also provides local farmers with funds and advanced concepts, which will help guide them onto the path of prosperity.