Observations on Agriculture, Countryside and Farmers Part VI: In the world of seeds, there is a seed (Part II)

Two. Seed, Germplasm and Seed Industry in China

1, China seed

China has a long history of seed and variety resources. In thousands of years of traditional civilized society, China cultivated five grains and raised six livestock, forming a traditional agricultural model of combining agriculture with mulberry and agriculture with weaving. At the same time, a unique agricultural technology system of intensive cultivation and land cultivation has been formed, and many world-leading agricultural scientific and technological achievements have been made, which has made historic contributions to promoting the progress of human civilization.

In animal and plant breeding, China has cultivated and accumulated a large number of variety resources in the long-term development, which can be summarized into two categories: crops and livestock and poultry.

In terms of crop varieties, the Book of Songs in the Spring and Autumn Period has already mentioned the choice of "A" and recorded many excellent varieties. In the Han dynasty, the variety breeding technology of "ear selection method" was invented; During the Northern and Southern Dynasties, measures similar to the present "Dantian" appeared to prevent impurities and protect purity. Qi Yao Min Shu in the Northern Wei Dynasty summarized the asexual propagation techniques such as cutting, rooting, layering and grafting. There are more than 3,000 rice varieties recorded in agricultural classics and local chronicles in the Qing Dynasty, and the crop variety resources show remarkable diversification characteristics.

In terms of livestock and poultry varieties, as early as in primitive society, traditional six animals such as horses, cattle, sheep, pigs, dogs and chickens have been domesticated independently and raised artificially. Livestock breeding technology appeared in the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period. In the Han Dynasty, great breakthroughs were made in livestock breeding and distant hybridization, and excellent breeds such as South China Pig, North China Pig, Qinchuan Cattle and Guanzhong Donkey were bred. Tongzhou sheep bred in the Tang Dynasty is still one of the excellent sheep breeds. During the Ming and Qing dynasties, the variety of livestock and poultry increased greatly, and famous varieties such as Wenchang chicken and Beijing duck appeared.

/kloc-Before the 9th century, China was an agricultural society. Agriculture supports politics, soldiers, cities and countries, and the operation of state machinery depends on agricultural tax. Until June 2006, 65438+ 10 1, the agricultural tax was abolished nationwide. And every time there is a qualitative leap in agriculture, the key depends on the seed revolution. As far as China is concerned, the introduction of wheat, high-quality rice, corn, sweet potato and other varieties has had a fundamental impact on economic and social development. Seed revolution is the source of agricultural society and economic prosperity.

In the early years of the Northern Song Dynasty, when Quanzhou merchants brought Zhancheng rice from Southeast Asia to Quanzhou, Fujian, farmers found that this rice named after Zhancheng originated in central and southern Vietnam today, with early maturity, high yield, drought tolerance, strong adaptability, short growth period, and multiple cropping of rice and wheat, which can harvest two seasons a year and increase the yield per mu. Therefore, Zhancheng rice spread rapidly to the Yangtze River basin and South China, and the planting area in Song Dynasty reached 720 million mu, thus establishing the position of Jiangnan economic center. It was during this period that the proverb "Suzhou and Shanghai are familiar, and the world is sufficient" was born. The introduction of excellent rice seeds stimulated the economic and social development of the whole Song Dynasty. Four great inventions of ancient china's papermaking, gunpowder, printing and compass were three great inventions in the Song Dynasty. At that time, the scale of enterprises in the Song Dynasty exceeded that of many dynasties before and even after. It is estimated that the gross domestic product of the Song Dynasty accounts for half of the world, and it is a real superpower. This is all the contribution of a seed!

2. Seed industry in China

Since the 20th century, the research results and methods of modern natural science have been gradually applied to agriculture, which has promoted the transformation of agricultural research from traditional experience to modern science. Because the seed industry is professional, considering its scientificity and rigor, it is still expressed in standardized language.

19 14, Jinling university bred the first modern wheat variety in China. After that, I cultivated a large number of excellent crop varieties through various methods and channels, and the average yield of main crops increased by more than five times. Since the founding of New China, China's crop genetics and breeding technology has been continuously developed, and more than 7,000 new varieties have been bred, and 5-6 large-scale varieties have been upgraded.

Rice: In 1950s, China cultivated a number of dwarf varieties, such as Dwarf Nantes. In 1970s, the "three lines" of hybrid rice were realized. The "two-line" hybrid rice was bred in 1990s, which achieved three leaps in rice breeding technology and played a key role in ensuring food security.

With regard to wheat, China experienced two stages: disease resistance and stable yield in 1950s and dwarf high yield in 1970s. In the 1990s, China entered the stage of high-quality and high-yield breeding, and successively selected a number of excellent varieties such as Xiaoyan series and McKee series, which made great contributions to wheat production in China.

Maize: After the initial commercial breeding stage with combining ability as the core, China's breeding technology has entered the modern biological breeding stage represented by double haploid breeding, molecular marker-assisted breeding and genetic engineering. Excellent varieties such as Zhong Dan series, Zheng Dan series and Jingke series have emerged continuously, which has effectively promoted the continuous improvement of maize yield and the upgrading of varieties in China.

Cotton: In the 1990s, China successively created univalent and bivalent insect-resistant genes with independent intellectual property rights, and cultivated a large number of new transgenic insect-resistant cotton varieties, becoming the second country in the world to independently develop insect-resistant cotton with intellectual property rights, with a cumulative promotion area of over 580 million mu, accounting for more than 97% of the total area of insect-resistant cotton in China.

Since modern times, China has gradually established a modern scientific research system for animal husbandry, made important progress in breeding livestock and poultry and forage varieties, and continuously improved the level of animal husbandry. Since the beginning of the 20th century, foreign excellent varieties and local varieties have been introduced for hybrid improvement. By the 1970s, a number of urgently needed livestock breeds such as China Holstein cattle, Harbin white pig and China Merino sheep had been cultivated. In recent years, many excellent new breeds of livestock and poultry have been bred, such as Yucha 1 Pig, Yan Yellow Cattle, Bamei Mutton Sheep, Jingxing Yellow Feather Broiler, Z-type Peking Duck, Nongda No.3 Little Laying Hen, Wuzhishan Pig Inbred Line, etc. Some domestic varieties have occupied more than 40% of the domestic market, and their dependence on foreign varieties has obviously decreased.

Marked by the Seed Law promulgated in 2000, China's seed industry has gradually entered the stage of industrialization and marketization from the closed development mode led by the government. Seed is the most basic and important means of production in agricultural production, and also an important carrier of agricultural science and technology. It is of great significance to increase agricultural production and income, increase farmers' income, improve the quality of life and ensure national food security.

First, there is a large market demand for seed industry. In 20 18, the market size of seed industry in China was 1 174 billion yuan. In 20 19, the overall market size of seed industry reached an inflection point, reaching1/92 billion yuan. It is estimated that in 20021year, the market size of seed industry in China will reach124.2 billion yuan. It has become the second largest international seed market after the United States.

The second is the concentration of seed varieties. On the one hand, China's seed industry is concentrated, mainly composed of corn, rice, wheat, soybean and potato, and the total share of these five varieties in 20 19 is about 70%. On the other hand, China's seed enterprises are concentrated in large agricultural provinces. At present, there are 36,000 seed-related companies in China, and the number of seed enterprises in 15 provinces and cities exceeds 1000, most of which are agricultural provinces. There are 3,450 in Jilin and 3,075 in Shandong.

The third is the acceleration of seed industry innovation. In the era of planned economy, because the breeding activities are mainly concentrated in agricultural research institutes, the overall breeding enthusiasm of seed enterprises is not high, participation is less, and there is not enough economic strength and scientific research talents to carry out in-depth cooperation with agricultural research institutes. Therefore, the research and development achievements of seed industry and the promotion of new products in China have been less. Since the reform and opening up, especially after the promulgation of the Seed Law, the seed industry and seed companies in China, which are divorced from the planned economy system, have gradually embarked on the road of independent research and development in education, and are comprehensive enterprises integrating "education, reproduction and promotion".

3. Germplasm resources in China

The origin of seed bank. Seed bank is the cornerstone of seed industry competition. Since the 1920s, Nikolai vavilov, a famous botanist in the former Soviet Union, has established the world's first seed bank-vavilov Seed Bank. At present, there are about 1750 seed banks in the world, and more than 7.4 million germplasm resources have been collected and preserved, including a large number of rare and endangered plants, endemic plants, important economic plants, important crops and wild relatives of important crops.

The seed bank is the best of the three. One is the most complete crop seed bank in the world, and it is the National Genetic Resources Protection Center of the United States. It is famous for its rich animal, plant and microbial resources. It is the earliest established crop seed bank and the most perfect preservation system in the world, and it is also the first modern germplasm bank in the world. The second is the world's largest wild plant seed bank, which is the British Millennium Seed Bank. Three are the safest crop seed banks in the world, Svalbard Global Seed Bank in Norway.

China Agricultural Germplasm Resource Bank was established in China Academy of Agricultural Sciences on June 1986+00, and has preserved 340 kinds of crop seeds such as grain, cotton, oil, fruits, vegetables, tea, sugar, mulberry and grass. Its main task is to preserve crops, vegetables, pastures and their wild related germplasm resources for a long time. By 2020, China's total crop germplasm resources will reach 520,000 copies, making it the second largest crop germplasm bank in the world.

In the protection of crop germplasm resources. At present, China has established a national protection system for agricultural germplasm resources, which is supported by national long-term repository, replica repository, ten medium-term repositories and 43 germplasm nurseries, supplemented by 2 14 original habitat protection points, and has preserved 517,000 agricultural germplasm resources for a long time. The construction of the new national long-term germplasm bank will be completed by the end of this year, and it will have the long-term preservation capacity of 6.5438+0.5 million resources after completion.

In the protection of forest and grass germplasm resources. China has built 99 forest germplasm resources banks, including 9 in-situ banks and 90 in different places, and has preserved more than 50,000 forest germplasm resources. The construction of the national forest and grass germplasm resource bank will be started, and 3 million resources will be preserved for a long time. A national and provincial, local and facility conservation system for germplasm resources will be gradually established.

Hunan Agricultural Germplasm Resource Bank is the first public service platform for comprehensive conservation and utilization of agricultural germplasm resources in Hunan Province, with a design of 6,543,800+0.5 million copies. Up to now, the database has collected and preserved more than 30,000 agricultural germplasm resources from 59 countries and regions around the world, including rice, peppers, oilseeds, melons and other germplasm resources, and built the world's largest pepper germplasm resource bank. The Bank provided more than 26,000 germplasm resources to more than 10 seed companies and Longping Hi-Tech in 17 provinces, which strongly supported the construction of the National Biological Seed Technology Innovation Center and the National Salt-tolerant Rice Technology Innovation Center.

Liu Shuai is in Changsha.

? 202 1 August 16