Across Thousands Of Miles, Shanghai's Young Agricultural Scientists Sow The Future In The Silicon Valley Of Seed Industry

"Southern propagation" refers to the method of bringing crop varieties to Hainan Province in autumn and winter every year to make use of the suitable light and temperature conditions in the tropical region to engage in the selection and breeding of crop varieties, seed production and germplasm identification. Hainan National Southern Propagation Base has an important position in China's agricultural development and is a scarce and irreplaceable national strategic resource. Every autumn and winter, a large number of researchers and breeders from Shanghai chase the sun, cross thousands of miles, and go to Hainan to carry out crop generation, expansion, identification, etc., in order to accelerate the breeding process, week after week.

Seed a grain of heavy weight. To achieve agricultural modernisation, germplasm resources are the foundation. For agricultural researchers, southern propagation is undoubtedly the most effective "accelerator" for the selection and breeding of new varieties. The southern propagation base is known as the Silicon Valley of the seed industry, and more than 70% of the germplasm resources of China's major crops have undergone southern propagation. By bringing local summer crops harvested in autumn to the southern tropics for re-planting and breeding, agricultural researchers can breed at least two more generations of germplasm each year.

Migratory Birds
All Year Round

After entering April, the high temperature in Lingshui area of Hainan continued, and the sun was blazing in the sky, and the heat waves rolled over the paddy fields of the southern propagation base, and Wang Kai, a scientific researcher of the Crop Research Institute of the Municipal Academy of Agricultural Sciences, busied himself with collecting the last batch of ripe rice breeding materials from the base in the fields. At the end of April every year, the work of southern rice propagation comes to an end. After the collection of this batch of rice, we can not rest, need to immediately take the material back to Shanghai, for the upcoming new round of breeding work to get ready.

Southern rice breeding usually starts in winter. In December each year, to the end of the breeding work in Shanghai, Wang Kai and the Municipal Academy of Agricultural Sciences Crops team of other staff together, will be hundreds of paper bags containing rice breeding materials carefully loaded into the suitcase, and went to the warmth of Hainan, for the southern propagation of rice plus generation. These paper bags but the size of a palm, the bag mouth by neatly folded, the seeds were densely wrapped in it, each paper bag is carefully marked with the identity of the material related information. "These materials are the team of researchers after many field observations and laboratory multi-part auxiliary testing screened out, is the comprehensive traits outstanding performance, or have our breeding target traits of the seed 'best'." Wang Kai said, these seemingly ordinary paper bags are the most cherished luggage, carrying the dreams and hopes of breeding researchers.

In addition to these carefully carried paper bags, Wang Kai's group also has about 20,000 rice breeding materials shipped in advance by courier to the southern propagation base each year, which need to be sown before the end of December to ensure a smooth harvest in May of the following year. Although there are local workers to assist with the labour, most of the researchers choose to do the work themselves for the key materials, as any mistake would mean that years of hard work would go down the drain.

Whether it's rice or maize breeding, the most time-consuming and labour-intensive part of the process is hand-pollination. "Pollination is a test of physical strength and endurance." This year is the corn team Hu Xueyou to participate in the first year of work, the first time to the southern propagation base he has felt the southern breeding breeding is not easy, "corn plants are tall, the leaves are prickly, high humidity in Hainan, the corn field is particularly hot. Pollination on the temperature, the operation of the high degree of meticulous requirements, a little improper, pollen contamination, the material will be wasted." Hu Xueyou said, Hainan rainy, once the rain pollination work will not be able to carry out, in order not to miss the focus of the material pollen spit silk of a brief moment, researchers need to squat in the field to observe, capture in time, and quickly complete the artificial pollination, bagging and other work. Every year, the critical period of artificial pollination of maize coincides with the Spring Festival, many researchers in order to do a good job of breeding have given up to go home for the New Year.

"Each stage has different hard work. Take rice as an example, we need to rush before the sun rises, while the rice has not yet blossomed and scattered pollen, the material of the previous afternoon cut glumes for the male treatment and bagging, and then in the morning between 11:00 to 2:00 p.m. to pollinate, and the sun is about to go down to continue a new round of cut glumes, almost busy from dawn to dark." Wang Kai said that although the field work is hard, through southern propagation plus generation, not only can it significantly shorten the breeding cycle, but also identify the disease resistance and response characteristics of breeding materials to temperature and light, and improve the competitiveness of crops. "Southern propagation is an excellent way to screen varieties. Researchers can visually observe which varieties have stronger resistance and conduct direct screening tests for related diseases, thus finding disease-resistant rice varieties quickly and effectively." Wang Kai said that southern propagation is also a natural variety "screener".