A villager works in a field in Xindian Town of Yuping Dong Autonomous County in Tongren City, southwest China's Guizhou Province, Feb. 21, 2022. Farming activities are in full swing across the country. (Photo by Hu Panxue/Xinhua)

As the weather turns warm, farmers across the country are busy with spring farming to lay a solid foundation for a bumper harvest this year.

China aims to ensure the full-year grain output in 2022 stays above 650 billion kg, according to this year's government work report.

Agricultural authorities have sent technical teams to help farmers in the crucial growing period.

Despite challenges such as COVID-19 and the delayed planting of winter wheat in a few areas, Tang Renjian, minister of agriculture and rural affairs, is confident that China can ensure a bumper harvest of summer grain thanks to policy and technical support, and improving grain crop conditions.

"We are capable of ensuring that more than 1.4 billion people have enough food to eat. Our rice bowls will be held more firmly in our own hands and filled with better and healthier food," Tang said earlier this month.

SMART FARM EQUIPMENT

Modern farming machinery is widely used in spring farming. More than 22 million tractors, sowing machines, rice transplanters, and other farm equipment are expected to be used this spring to improve agricultural productivity.

Farmers in Zhengzhuang village in Zaoyang, central China's Hubei Province, use unmanned subsoilers equipped with the Beidou satellite navigation system to reduce soil compaction.

"We have over 80 such unmanned subsoilers to help farmers with spring plowing," said Shen Hui, head of a local farming machinery cooperative.

By the end of last year, about 600,000 farming equipment units had been fitted with the China-developed Beidou satellite navigation system, which boosted the agricultural efficiency, said Wang Jiayun, an official with the agriculture ministry.

RAISING SOYBEAN OUTPUT

China is ramping up the production of soybean and oilseed crops through expanding growing areas and breeding good seeds.

The northernmost Heilongjiang Province, the largest production and supply base of high-quality soybeans in China, plans to expand the soybean planting area by 10 million mu (about 670,000 hectares) this year.

Li Guoxiang, a researcher at the Rural Development Institute, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said that China's soybean supply is highly dependent on imports. It is necessary to expand soybean planting, he added.

Increasing the yield per unit area is the other key to raising soybean output, and China has stepped up efforts to breed new soybean varieties.

By the end of last year, 23 new soybean varieties had been bred in Heilongjiang Province, with an average yield per mu exceeding 250 kg.

The low yield per unit area has long been a primary factor restricting soybean production capacity in China. New soybean varieties will be conducive to boosting soybean productivity, said Cao Jujin, director of a soybean research institute in Suihua, Heilongjiang Province.