'Fan' transforming farming in Sanya

In the sun-drenched experimental fields of Yazhouwan in Sanya, Hainan province, the future of farming is being coded one algorithm at a time. Here, the ancient practice of crop breeding — traditionally a decade-long pursuit reliant on a breeder's intuition — is being rewritten as a precision-driven science.

At the heart of this transformation is the "Future Agriculture Nexus", or Fan, an artificial intelligence-powered platform jointly launched by the Yazhouwan National Laboratory and Chinese tech company Huawei in November 2025. Designed to act as a "central nervous system" for agricultural data, Fan aims to address one of the biggest bottlenecks in seed development — fragmented data.

Chen Fan, a deputy to the National People's Congress and deputy director of the Yazhouwan National Laboratory, said in an interview with China Daily that the lab's mission is to develop major strategic crop varieties that meet real demand.

"As the only national-level laboratory in China's agricultural sector, our lab's mission is to develop major strategic crop varieties to meet real demand," Chen said.

Traditional breeding work relies heavily on experience, he said. Moving to precision breeding requires analyzing correlations within massive amounts of data — including both public and private datasets — on crop traits and genotypes.

The Fan platform addresses this challenge by aggregating and standardizing disparate data on genotype, phenotype and environment — often referred to by experts as "data silos" — into a unified system. Powered by Huawei's AI data lake solution, the platform uses artificial intelligence to screen information and automate complex analytical workflows.

The results are significant. According to Yuan Yuan, president of Huawei's data storage product line, the system can shorten the breeding cycle for crops such as rice from the traditional eight to 10 years to just three to four years — a 50 percent reduction in time and a 30 percent improvement in overall efficiency.

"The impact is transformative," Yuan said.

"We are leveraging AI to boost productivity across the entire breeding process. It is a systematic approach," Chen said. "The Fan project is like building an underlying platform on which we can develop various vertical models and AI agents to solve different problems."

Such efforts align with China's strategic priorities, with seeds often described as the "chips" of global agriculture.

"Our laboratory is establishing the largest and most extensive innovation platform for biological breeding in China, with the most comprehensive system in terms of scale, scope and infrastructure," Chen said.

"We want to advance the construction of the 'Nanfan Silicon Valley' and establish a leading hub for future agriculture," he added.

While AI is sharpening research tools inside the lab, international cooperation is expanding the laboratory's reach. Recognizing that food security is a shared priority among Global South nations, the lab is strengthening ties with Latin America.

In August 2025, the China-LAC Sustainable Food Innovation Center, established with support from the Yazhouwan National Laboratory, inaugurated key branch centers in Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay. The Brazil branch serves as a key hub for collaboration.

"China and Brazil share common priorities in agricultural technology, climate resilience and sustainable development," Chen said.

The cooperation extends beyond diplomacy into practical science. Researchers are leveraging a unique geographical symmetry: Hainan's location at 18 degrees north latitude mirrors Brazil's position at 18 degrees south, providing similar sunshine and temperature conditions that are ideal for collaborative crop research, Chen said.

This allows the joint development of soybean varieties in Sanya that can be directly applicable to Brazilian farms.

Meanwhile, the favorable policies of the Hainan Free Trade Port could also facilitate the future import of such soybeans into China, Chen added.

masi@chinadaily.com.cn