On October 16, 2022, the first "Party Representative Channel" of the 20th National Congress was opened. Lin Zhanxi, chief scientist of the National Engineering Research Center for Mycological Grasses, was interviewed. (Courtesy of People's Vision/Photo)
On October 16, 2022, on the opening day of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, at about 8:40 a.m., on the north side of the central hall on the first floor of the Great Hall of the People, 79-year-old Lin Zhanxi stood on the "Party Representative Channel" and faced the live camera to talk about "happiness grass" and "friendship grass" to the world again.
Lin Zhanxi is the chief scientist of the National Engineering Research Center for Mycological Grass and the doctoral supervisor of Fujian Agriculture and Forestry University, and began to study the technology of fungi and grass in 1983. In the self-introduction session, Lin Zhanxi said that fungus grass has become the first industry of Fujian-Nanjing poverty alleviation cooperation, helping more than 17,500 farmers in Xihaigu, Ningxia, get rid of poverty, known as "rich grass" and "happiness grass".
Fungus refers to the herb that can cultivate edible mushrooms and medicinal mushrooms. Since 1986, the fungal grass technology invented by Lin Zhanxi has been extended to 506 counties in 31 provinces (autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the central government), and only "grass for wood" to cultivate shiitake mushrooms can cut down 20 million cubic meters of trees per year in the country.
With the popularity of the TV series "Mountains and Seas" in early 2021, Lin Zhanxi, the prototype of the agricultural technology expert in the play, is also becoming more and more well-known.
In 2017, the fungus technology was listed as a key project of the China-United Nations Peace and Development Fund, which was promoted to the world and has now spread to 106 countries and regions in the world.
In addition to helping farmers to alleviate poverty, another major area of the application of fungal and grass technology is ecological environment governance, which is also an unfinished wish of Lin Zhanxi.
He said, "I hope that in my lifetime, we will build an ecological security barrier on both sides of the Yellow River of the Mother River, so that the Mother River of the Yellow River will become a happy river that benefits the people." ”
Abandon "officials" and follow the study
Southern Weekend: You only embarked on the full-time academic path when you were 40 years old, what kind of opportunity made you make the decision to abandon the "official" and study?
Lin Zhanxi: I graduated from Fujian Agricultural College (now Fujian Agriculture and Forestry University) in 1968, and three years later I was assigned to work at the Sanming Fungal Research Institute to study the cultivation and production of edible mushrooms. Later, he did administrative work at Fujian Agriculture and Forestry University.
In 1983, I was the second general secretary of the organ of Fujian Agricultural College, accompanied by the Fujian Provincial Science and Technology Poverty Alleviation Inspection Group, went to Longyan Changting County, where the scene was shocking: "Hanging River" is one or two meters higher than the cultivated land on both sides, the surrounding hills are barren, the cultivated land is desertified, the school is desolate, the ecological environment is extremely bad, farmers consume a large amount of wood to produce mushrooms, fungus and other edible mushrooms, trees that can plant fungi have been cut down, and the "contradiction between the fungal forest" has become increasingly prominent.
At that time, we proposed whether we could replace trees with grass and cultivate edible mushrooms. At the end of the expedition, I resigned from my administrative position and began to concentrate on the cultivation of edible mushrooms by "replacing trees with grass".
Southern Weekend: Is the study just starting well?
Lin Zhanxi: At first, there was no experimental site, so I borrowed 50,000 yuan from the engineering team of Fujian Agriculture and Forestry University to build a laboratory. At the time, that was equivalent to 500 times a family's monthly income. I thought, if the experiment fails, I'm afraid I won't be able to live a lifetime.
The conditions for the first 3 years were tough. Without a vaccination needle, I dismantled the bicycle at home and polished the steel wire instead; Without a shredder, I borrowed the feed shredder from the school farm and crushed the weeds as a medium. In 1986, the first experiment with shiitake mushrooms cultivated from mango was successful.
Southern Weekend: After your experiment was successful, you immediately began to participate in poverty alleviation work based on this technology?
Lin Zhanxi: At that time, it was not called poverty alleviation, but technology promotion. In 1988, I went to Youxi County, Sanming City, Fujian Province to promote fungus and grass technology, Youxi County also has a tradition of planting edible mushrooms, before it was planted with wood, so a large number of logging, "fungal forest contradiction" is more prominent.
In Youxi County, we have held more than 120 training courses on fungal grass technology, trained nearly 20,000 trainees, and the fungus technology has quickly spread widely in Youxi County. Later, the number of farmers who chose to "replace trees with grass" increased from 27 to 4236.
Southern Weekend: In 1992, your fungus grass won the Gold Medal of the Exhibition of the Geneva International Invention Competition and the Government Award of the Canton of Geneva.
Lin Zhanxi: On the night of the award, the Chinese delegation asked me, will I be so happy to sleep when I win the highest award? Of course, I am happy, but I am even more worried: I went to Geneva to participate in the exhibition and borrowed another 30,000 yuan, what if this old debt has not been repaid and a new debt has been added?
Southern Weekend: Didn't research funding or your personal financial situation improve at that time?
Lin Zhanxi: There is no obvious improvement, but there is always an "opportunity" for improvement. An American farm saw the commercial value of "mushroom seeds" and wanted to buy out the fungus technology, promising to hire me and my lover for $14,000 a month. This month's salary is more than a thousand times our monthly income.
If I signed a contract, I could become a multimillionaire, but then I would become an agent for American businesses to make Chinese money.
Southern Weekend: The international common name of the fungus is "Juncao", which looks like Hanyu Pinyin?
Lin Zhanxi: In 1996, at the first International Symposium on Mushroom Technology, we had difficulties in translating the name of the fungus, how to translate it, so that we can push the fungus to more countries? Some people are worried that the translation is "Juncao", foreigners do not understand what it is, and suggest that I use the English translation. However, I insisted on using the Hanyu Pinyin "Juncao" as the translated name. I wanted the world to know that this was an invention of Chinese.
17 achievements, international initiative and leadership
Southern Weekend: You are the prototype of the agricultural technology expert Ling Yinong in the TV series "Mountains and Seas". Fujian is a southeast coastal province, how did you come into contact with the poverty alleviation work in Ningxia, the northwestern province of Shangbei?
Lin Zhanxi: My relationship with poverty alleviation in Ningxia began in 1996. That year, the Central Organization Department and the China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation held a training course for county party secretaries and county chiefs in 592 poverty-stricken counties across the country in Xiamen, Fujian Province, and invited me to introduce fungal technology.
Liu Fu, then secretary of the Pengyang County Party Committee in Ningxia, was very interested in my technology, so I reported to the Fujian Provincial Poverty Alleviation Office and suggested that I help each other. In 1997, the second joint meeting of the Fujian-Nanjing Poverty Alleviation Cooperation listed the fungal grass technology as a Fujian-Ningxia poverty alleviation cooperation project.
Southern Weekend: When I first arrived in Ningxia, could local farmers accept the fungus?
Lin Zhanxi: Local farmers don't know much about fungi, so my initial expectation is that I will plant the fungi in the local area so that everyone can see the actual results.
The first time we went to Pengyang County, Guyuan City, Ningxia, we brought very little else with us, and the main luggage was 6 boxes of fungus grass seeds. Pengyang County dripping water into ice in winter, the temperature difference between day and night is large, I am worried about affecting the growth of edible mushrooms, so I built a semi-basement mushroom shed and used abandoned cave kilns to cultivate edible mushrooms. My team members and I used to live in the mushroom shed and get up at night to check on the temperature changes in the mushroom room. Half a year later, the cultivation of edible mushrooms such as shiitake mushrooms, oyster mushrooms, and bispores with straw was successful, but most of the local farmers were half-convinced, and we selected 27 demonstration households and taught them to plant mushrooms by hand, and the income of these farmers more than doubled that year.
Southern Weekend: Do you keep in touch with local farmers on a regular basis?
Lin Zhanxi: I will often go to Ningxia. I also went several times this year. I told the villagers that I was almost 80 years old, but as long as the villagers in Ningxia needed it, as long as I could still run, I would still help them at the age of 90.
Southern Weekend: In addition to poverty alleviation, what other areas can fungus grass play a role?
Lin Zhanxi: We have long realized that the application of fungi and grass in the field of ecological governance is very broad, especially in areas with serious soil erosion, such as the northwest region of the mainland. Some fungal grass varieties have developed root systems, and the effect of sand fixation is more obvious.
Southern Weekend: In which areas have you done this?
Lin Zhanxi: My team and I have successively carried out multi-type experimental demonstrations in Qinghai, Gansu, Inner Mongolia and other provinces along the Yellow River Basin, such as soil erosion control, desertification control, sand control and sand fixation, improved saline and alkali land, and arsenic sandstone, and 17 achievements are at the international pioneering and leading level.
A test of life and death
Southern Weekend: Your fungus technology has begun to be promoted overseas and become a model for international cooperation, can you tell us about the process?
Lin Zhanxi: Since Papua New Guinea, fungal grass technology has gone abroad. Papua New Guinea is an island nation in the South Pacific and in 2001 a technical assistance project for fungus was launched in Papua New Guinea.
When we cultivated the first batch of various edible mushrooms with local wild mushrooms, the local celebration meeting was held with more than 5,000 people, the five-star red flag was raised, the Chinese national anthem was played, and the fungus farmers who had won a bumper harvest shouted happily "China, fungi grass"!
Southern Weekend: Can farmers in Papua New Guinea accept Chinese fungal grass?
Lin Zhanxi: The people of Papua New Guinea call fungus grass "Chinese grass" or "forest grass". Brian Waiyi, known as the "first person in Papua New Guinea fungus", said that some of the "fungus fans" have changed their names to fungus, and some have used fungus grass to name their children to pin their beautiful hopes on life. His own son's full name was "Fungus Wayi".
Southern Weekend: When you go abroad to promote fungal and grass technology, most of them are in underdeveloped countries, have you encountered a more dangerous situation?
Lin Zhanxi: In September 2007, in a country in southeastern Africa, one day at dusk, I was returning to the capital from a demonstration site in the mountains 70 kilometers away, and when the car drove to a mountain pass not far from the capital, I suddenly rushed out of a car to block the way.
Three armed robbers jumped from the car, and the robbers held guns to my head and abducted us to the barren mountains and wild mountains dozens of kilometers away.
I tell the other side that we are Chinese experts who are here to help you get out of poverty. But the robbers know what it takes to get rid of poverty, looting our cameras, mobile phones and wallets, and thinking that we have too little money and are a little poor.
Before leaving, they also threw our car keys in the mountains.
Southern Weekend: How did you get out of trouble?
Lin Zhanxi: As soon as the robber left, we began to look for the car keys, we searched for a long time, and finally found the car keys with a little bit of moonlight.
Southern Weekend: China's fungi grass has been aiding foreign countries for many years, how effective is it?
Lin Zhanxi: China has carried out various types of foreign aid training in fungal and grass technology, including technical training courses, official training courses, bilateral training courses, etc., and has also compiled five-level courses according to the different professional levels and training goals of the trainees, so as to make the training more targeted and practical.
Currently, 18 languages are being used for the spread of fungal technology.
Poverty alleviation is the foothold and starting point of foreign aid for fungal and grass technology. In the practice of international cooperation in fungal grass technology, we have innovated the implementation mode of the fungal grass aid project, with the goal of poverty reduction, localization, simplification and standardization of technology, so that farmers can "understand at a glance", "learn as soon as they learn" and "do it once", so that the poorest local people can also participate.
In the most difficult test, the fungus grass came back from the dead 7 times
Southern Weekend: What's the hardest test you've ever done?
Lin Zhanxi: In Inner Mongolia Alxa League Ulanbu and Desert, here is one of the four major sources of sandstorms in China, and it is very difficult to manage.
I remember very clearly that the fungus we planted came back to life 7 times before we finally subdued the quicksand.
Southern Weekend: How did you pay attention to Ulambu and the desert?
Lin Zhanxi: In the spring of 2013, I came to Ulanbu and the desert on the banks of the Yellow River to investigate. In Liujiaoshatou, Dengkou County, Bayannur City, high winds and floods inject large amounts of yellow sand from both sides of the Yellow River into the river every year.
The average annual rainfall there is less than 160 mm, accompanied by 6 or 7 strong winds all year round, and the newly grown fungal grass seedlings will make the wind and sand bald overnight.
I am a person who does not accept defeat, and the team must persist no matter what.
Southern Weekend: Growing fungi in the desert shouldn't be easy, right?
Lin Zhanxi: In the first year, the wind and sand destroyed the leaves of the fungus and grass that were planted, and everyone said "finished", but I said it would not be finished. The following year, the flood washed down the river, washing away all the fungus. I still don't concede defeat and continue to plant another variety.
Southern Weekend: Did you find a suitable grass for desert cultivation later?
Lin Zhanxi: It took us ten years to introduce 20 different varieties of fungi and grasses, and finally cultivated and domesticated two varieties of fungi and grasses suitable for growing in Ulambu and the desert.
Test data show that a fungal grass that grows for 150 days can firmly lock in more than 20 square meters of sandy land with roots and an average yield of 12 tons per mu of fresh grass. Our team has planted 3,000 acres of fungal grass in Ulambu and on the edge of the desert.
Southern Weekend: Why are you so fascinated by the Desert Mushroom Project?
Lin Zhanxi: This is a new idea for harnessing the Yellow River. In 2021, Liu Guishatou in Dengkou County, Bayannaoer City, experienced three major flood peaks, and the 4-meter-high giant fungus grass we planted did not lodging. It has been proven that the shore slope protection of macrophyllum grass is stronger than that of other shrubs and herbs that fix sand.
This year, our team built a 300-meter-long ecological barrier of giant fungus grass in the Yellow River, where the quicksand is most severe, and the huge root system is like hundreds of millions of hands, tightly twisting the yellow sand. During the 71 days of the Yellow River's flood season, this ecological barrier reduced the flow of yellow sand into the Yellow River by more than 1,400 tons.
Southern Weekend: You are 79 years old this year, is there anything else that has not been fulfilled?
Lin Zhanxi: I hope that in my lifetime, we will build an ecological security barrier of thousands of mushrooms and grasses on both sides of the Yellow River of the Mother River, so that the Mother River of the Yellow River will become a happy river that benefits the people.
But I also know that it takes a sustained effort.
Southern Weekend reporter Zhai Xingli