Xiaoman looks at wheat yellow for three days, and Xiaoman is full of rehmannia for ten days.
It's almost the time of the busy "three summers" again. All kinds of tractors, harvesters, and threshers have been well maintained, riveted, and ready to do a big job. But some farmers are worried: the wheat on the hilly slopes cannot be used by machinery, and the labor is too expensive, so it is difficult to find......
The mainland is a multi-terrain country, with 700 million mu of hilly and mountainous farmland, accounting for about one-third of the total cultivated land area of the country. At the same time that large-scale agricultural machinery is basically popularized in plain areas, the comprehensive mechanization rate of crop farming, planting and harvesting in hilly and mountainous provinces is just over half, and many hilly and mountainous areas are facing the dilemma of "inorganic and easy to use" and "inorganic and usable".
700 million acres of hilly and mountainous land, producing more than 50% of the country's rape, more than 60% of fruits, nearly 80% of potatoes, and more than 90% of tea...... To establish a big food concept, the rice bowl firmly in their own hands, the 700 million acres of hilly and mountainous land, should not become a forgotten corner of China's agricultural machinery.
Harvesters harvest wheat at the National Modern Agricultural Industrial Park in Guanghan City, Sichuan Province, May 13 (drone photo). Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Yang Jin
The 500 acres of paddy fields contracted by Xia Haibin, a large grain grower in Xinxian County, Henan, have more than 100 acres of relatively large slopes. Once, the tractor got stuck in the mud while plowing, and finally hired an excavator to haul it out, which cost a lot of money. "The tractor is big and heavy, and it's not good on slopes!"
At present, the total number of agricultural machinery enterprises in mainland China has exceeded 8,000, and many well-known domestic brands have broken through a number of technical bottlenecks such as power shifting, continuously variable transmission, and hybrid power.
According to data from the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, the comprehensive mechanization rate of wheat and corn harvesting in mainland China exceeded 97% and 90% respectively. In the Northeast Plain and the North China Plain, large-scale agricultural machinery operations can be seen everywhere, but in the hilly and mountainous areas, Xia Haibin's trouble is not an exception.
Workers drive agricultural machinery to harvest wheat in high-standard farmland in Quguoqiang Village, Linzhou County, Lhasa, Tibet, October 12, 2023. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Zhang Rufeng
Statistics show that the application level of agricultural mechanization in the mainland is very unbalanced between different industries and regions. In hilly and mountainous provinces, the comprehensive mechanization rate of crop cultivation and harvesting is only 53.5 percent, about 20 percentage points lower than the national average.
What's more, hilly and mountainous areas also face a severe shortage of agricultural population. If the level of agricultural mechanization does not rise, it will also increase the risk of cultivated land abandonment.
Hills and mountains play an irreplaceable role in ensuring food security and diversifying food supply. The introduction of small, medium and micro agricultural machinery with high quality and low price, reliable quality, easy operation and suitable for use in mountainous areas is not only the expectation of farmers, but also the call of the market, and the need for national food security.
Large-scale agricultural machinery and equipment gallop in thousands of miles of fertile fields, so majestic! But when he arrived in the hilly and mountainous areas, he suffered from the disease of "not adapting to water and soil", and he could not go up the slope or go down, and it was easy to lie down...... Some farmer brothers wondered: "We can build quantum computers and spacecraft, why are simple agricultural machinery 'not easy to use' and 'always bad'?" ”
The simple words express the pain points in the hearts of farmers, and also reflect the dilemma of agricultural machinery development.
The mountainous and hilly terrain is complex and diverse, and the requirements for agricultural machinery are higher. For example, tractors must have high transition mobility, slope operation safety, steep and narrow space passability, complex ground environment adaptability, and diversity of machinery and tools, etc., which makes the research and development difficulty and manufacturing cost of agricultural machinery in mountainous and hilly areas increase sharply.
Mountainous and hilly agricultural machinery is "picky" and has poor versatility, and some areas also need special models. Suitable for the Loess Plateau in the northwest, in the southeast hilly area, it may become a "lame duck".
On April 16, at the Institute of Agricultural Sciences in Lixiahe District, Jiangsu Province (Yangzhou Academy of Agricultural Sciences), agricultural mechanics drove agricultural machinery to plough farmland (drone photo). Xinhua News Agency (photo by Meng Delong)
Dong Shungui, the person in charge of the modern agricultural machinery cooperative in Shangcheng County, Henan, once introduced a batch of agricultural machinery from the southern mountainous area and tried it out in the rice fields, tea gardens and camellia gardens in the Dabie Mountains, but most of them were "unadaptable". He asked his soul about this: "Is there no agricultural machinery suitable for farming in the Dabie Mountains?" ”
It is difficult to achieve mass production of customized and special agricultural machinery, and the cost cannot be suppressed, the profit cannot be raised, and the enthusiasm of the enterprise cannot be mobilized. In the face of performance and cost, quality and efficiency, it is difficult for agricultural machinery enterprises to sit on the "cold bench", which has also created a bad impression of domestic small and medium-sized agricultural machinery "always bad" and "not resistant" to a certain extent.
At present, the global agricultural machinery industry has formed a "double competition" pattern of coexistence of large-scale competition of giants and specialized competition of small and medium-sized enterprises. For many small and medium-sized agricultural machinery enterprises in the mainland, taking the road of differentiated development, coming up with good products in the subdivision track, meeting specific and precise needs, and taking the mainland's huge agricultural base, can also be promising.
The conditions of agricultural production on the mainland vary greatly, with dry land and paddy fields; There are vast plains, there are mountains and hills; There are farms, cooperatives, and more often smallholder farmers. The agricultural machinery industry is in urgent need of upgrading, and the starting point of upgrading should first be to meet the production needs of different farmers and enhance the favorability and trust of domestic agricultural machinery.
In 2023, the No. 1 document of the central government proposes to step up the research and development of large-scale intelligent agricultural machinery and equipment, small machinery and horticultural machinery suitable for hilly and mountainous areas; In 2024, the No. 1 document of the central government also proposed to vigorously implement the action of making up for the shortcomings of agricultural machinery and equipment, improve the subsidy policy for the purchase and application of agricultural machinery, and open up a "green channel" for the identification of agricultural machinery that is urgently needed.
At present, at the policy level, the state vigorously supports agricultural machinery enterprises to solve the difficult problem of "one large and one small" agricultural machinery and equipment. The categories of agricultural machinery subsidies are also constantly optimized, and some small and micro agricultural machinery and special agricultural machinery suitable for cultivated land operations in mountainous and hilly areas are gradually included in the subsidy catalog.
Farmers drive a harvester to harvest rice in Yingxi Village, Sunzhuang Street, Hai'an City, Jiangsu Province, October 29, 2023 (drone photo). Xinhua News Agency (photo by Zhai Huiyong)
Through many efforts, the current situation of "inorganic use" in hilly and mountainous areas has been improved, and breakthroughs have been made in short board agricultural machinery and equipment. For example, 320 horsepower continuously variable speed tractors, mountain corn seeders, etc. have been mass-produced, and large-scale high-horsepower agricultural machinery, small agricultural machinery in hilly and mountainous areas have been launched, and "good agricultural machinery has been used" has been initially realized.
The better news is that the State Council recently issued the "Action Plan for Promoting Large-scale Equipment Renewal and Consumer Goods Trade-in" proposed to continue to implement the subsidy policy for scrapping and updating agricultural machinery, combined with the needs of agricultural production and the development level of agricultural mechanization, and solidly promote the scrapping and renewal of old agricultural machinery and accelerate the structural adjustment of agricultural machinery.
This will usher in a rare market opportunity for the development of domestic agricultural machinery. With the help of the policy and increased research and development efforts, 700 million acres of hilly and mountainous land will usher in new opportunities for agricultural machinery assistance, and the "forgotten corners" will be full of vitality.
Source: Xinhua News Agency