Technology helps high-quality cotton yield
It is now the cotton harvest season, and cotton-producing areas are ushering in a “boom” of large-scale harvesting. The reporter learned from the National Cotton Trading Market affiliated to China Supply and Marketing Group that in 2022, thanks to factors such as the increase in cotton planting area and the suitable natural climate, cotton will show a high yield pattern. The total output is expected to be around 6 million tons, an increase of 2% from the previous year. .
Ding Haowu, Secretary of the Party Committee and Chairman of the National Cotton Trading Market, said that at present, the cotton purchase progress in Xinjiang, my country’s largest cotton production base, has reached nearly 40%. At the same time, the mechanization process of Xinjiang’s cotton industry is accelerating. According to statistics from the National Cotton Trading Market Big Data Center, the proportion of machine-picked cotton processing in Xinjiang has increased from 35% in 2014 to 86% in 2021. Among them, northern Xinjiang has basically achieved 100% mechanized operations.
Mechanization promotes “three increases”
Abibula Yasheng is an employee of the 49th Regiment of Tumushuke City, the Third Division of the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps. This year, he planted 80 acres of cotton. On October 8, he completed the harvesting of all cotton fields with a cotton picker. . “In the past, you had to rent a car and go to a county hundreds of kilometers away to hire cotton pickers, but now the entire process is mechanized.” When it comes to cotton cultivation today, Abibullah bluntly said that it is “easy.”
The mechanization level of cotton planting is “rising steadily”, and “smart cotton fields” are spread across northern and southern Xinjiang, promoting Xinjiang’s cotton production to show a “three-increase” trend of area increase, total output increase, and unit yield increase.
Zhou Run, head of the Hongxingxiang Planting Professional Cooperative in Beiquan Town, Shihezi General Field, Shihezi City, Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, said that this year, due to the use of fully mechanized planting, field management technology in place and stable meteorological conditions, the cooperative’s The average yield per mu of cotton fields is expected to reach 420 kilograms, an increase of 13 kilograms compared with 2021.
Ding Haowu introduced that since Xinjiang implemented the cotton target price reform in 2014, the income of cotton farmers has been effectively guaranteed. Coupled with the improvement of mechanization level, Xinjiang’s cotton industry has achieved considerable development. According to statistics, as the yield per unit area increases year by year, Xinjiang’s cotton output has also increased from 4.149 million tons in 2014 to 5.129 million tons in 2021, and its proportion in the country has increased from 66% in 2014 to 89%.
Digitalization benefits farmers
With the advancement of data collection and platform construction in recent years, cotton has become the most digitalized bulk agricultural product in my country. Shan Xu, the person in charge of the relevant business of the National Cotton Trading Market, said that the “online credit” of the National Cotton Trading Market (Xinjiang Mianyun Loan, Cotton Easy Loan, Cotton Farmer Loan) can be unsecured, and can be reviewed, loaned and credited in seconds. , which greatly solves the problem of difficulty in obtaining loans for cotton farmers during the planting process.
The digital construction of Xinjiang’s cotton industry originated from the Xinjiang cotton target price reform pilot that began in 2014. Shen Jieqiang, deputy general manager of the National Cotton Trading Market, said that at that time, entrusted by the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, the National Cotton Trading Market actively participated in the implementation of the “professional warehousing supervision + warehouse notarization inspection” system and the target price reform information platform, and the Xinjiang cotton market price monitoring platform The construction, operation and maintenance work has effectively promoted the digitalization process of Xinjiang’s cotton industry.
Through the registration of basic information of cotton farmers, verification of planting area, seed cotton sales statistics, processing information tracking, lint cotton storage supervision, Quality Data collection such as notarization and weight in-warehouse inspection, out-warehouse sales flow tracking, etc. Every bale of cotton in Xinjiang has its own “ID card.”
“Cotton has become the only agricultural product among domestic agricultural products that has achieved full digital supervision.” Shen Jieqiang told reporters that based on the Xinjiang cotton target price reform information platform, the National Cotton Trading Market has established a comprehensive service platform for cotton farmers. As of October 2022, the cotton farmer platform has nearly 180,000 active cotton farmer users.
“In the future, the comprehensive service platform for cotton farmers will also realize the supply and demand docking of agricultural supplies, agricultural machinery, agricultural technology, seed cotton acquisition and other resources.” Ding Haowu said that digital services will help reduce the cost of cotton planting and increase the income of cotton farmers. , to achieve a win-win situation for all parties.
Strengthen the cultivation of new cotton varieties
The report of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China stated that high-quality development is the primary task of comprehensively building a modern socialist country. For the cotton industry, how to understand the importance of high-quality development in the new era and new stage?
Ding Haowu believes that at present, the development level of my country’s cotton processing, inspection and circulation links is relatively advanced in the world, and what needs to be improved is mainly the front end of the industry.
In terms of varieties, due to differences in the intrinsic indicators of different seeds, the consistency of lint quality is greatly affected. Therefore, the management of cotton seeds in major cotton-producing countries in the world is very strict. Excessive, chaotic and miscellaneous cotton species will lead to the degradation of cotton species. It is generally believed in the industry that there should be as few cotton species as possible in the same ecological area.
The cotton seed issue has attracted the attention of relevant departments. This year, the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps will strengthen the breeding of new cotton varieties on the basis of building a long-term mechanism for cotton target price policies. Shihezi City of the Eighth Division has also promoted and applied the recommended cotton variety traceability system to accurately understand the application of recommended varieties for agriculture and industry.
Follow the rulesFrom a cultural perspective, Ding Haowu introduced that the planting area of cotton farmers in my country ranges from a few acres or more than a dozen acres to hundreds or thousands of acres. Compared with developed countries, the area per household is still far behind, resulting in production costs. On the high side, it affects international competitiveness. Overall, there is still room for improvement in the scale and intensive development of the industry.
Judging from the planting model, most of my country’s cotton ginners are independent operating entities and need to bear the risk of market fluctuations, which is not conducive to industry stability and also leads to the decoupling of cotton farmers from the market. In foreign countries, large cotton farmers will build their own gins or entrust gins to process them and sell lint directly to the market.
Hongxingxiang Planting Professional Cooperative, where Zhou Run works, harvested 20,000 tons of seed cotton this year, and 60% of the cotton has not yet been sold. Due to the decline in seed cotton prices this year, cotton farmers are still waiting for prices to rebound. They also took a key step in exploring the disconnect with the market. The cooperative established a ginning factory, forming an operating model of “enterprise + cooperative + farmers” and an integrated industrial chain of “production, processing, and sales”.
Zhou Run said that in the next step, the cooperative plans to establish a more standardized cotton planting technology team to provide technical support for a larger area of standardized and high-quality cotton planting.
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