China News Service, Beijing, August 19 (Reporter Wang Enbo) The National Bureau of Statistics of China released national early rice production data on the 19th, showing that China's total early rice production in 2020 is 27.29 million tons, an increase of 1.028 million tons from 2019, an increase of 3.9%. A downward trend for 7 consecutive years.
Li Suoqiang, director of the Rural Department of the National Bureau of Statistics, said that although early rice production this year has been adversely affected by severe floods in some parts of the south and the yield has declined, thanks to the substantial increase in planting area, early rice production across the country has increased. In 2020, the sown area of early rice in China was 4751 thousand hectares, an increase of 300.7 thousand hectares or 6.8% over the previous year. In terms of different regions, 7 out of 10 early rice producing provinces (districts) have increased their sown area.
Governments at all levels in the main early rice producing areas have made every effort to implement various policies such as supporting agriculture and benefiting agriculture, grain growing subsidies, and minimum grain purchase prices, strengthening the organization of agricultural materials transfer, guiding the re-cultivation of wasteland from household to household, and vigorously promoting mechanical farming, mechanical planting, and unmanned farming. Live broadcast and other technologies actively encourage joint farming and joint cropping, land trusteeship, and unified prevention and control, and comprehensively promote large-scale operation and intensive production, effectively stimulating farmers' enthusiasm for growing grain. At the same time, the weather conditions for spring planting are beneficial to the overall production and also promote the smooth planting of early rice.
However, due to the severe floods in the south during the late stage of early rice growth, the yield has declined. The yield per hectare of early rice in China in 2020 is 5745.0 kg per hectare, which is a decrease of 157.3 kg per hectare or 2.7% from the previous year.
Li Suoqiang introduced that in the early stage of early rice growth, the water and heat in the main producing areas are suitable, and the tiller jointing and booting heading are better than the same period last year. However, when the harvest was about to "open the sickle", there were continuous heavy rains and extremely heavy rains in the south, and the rainfall in many places exceeded historical extremes. Low temperature, torrential rain, and flooding have caused early rice fields to fall to varying degrees and insufficient grouting, especially in Anhui, Jiangxi, Hubei, Hunan and other places.
But overall, Li Suoqiang said that the bumper summer grain harvest and the increase in early rice production still laid the foundation for China's stable grain production throughout the year. (Finish)