Breeders say how the livestock and poultry seed industry "out of the circle"
According to the latest "National Livestock and Poultry Genetic Improvement Program (2021-2035)" issued by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, the source rate of core livestock and poultry species in my country has exceeded 75%, but there is still a gap with developed countries.
In the field of agricultural breeding, the higher the level of organisms, the longer it will take to breed.
Compared with crops that can shorten the breeding period through southern breeding, there are almost no shortcuts to livestock breeding.
Moreover, for a long time, the breeding of livestock and poultry in our country has faced the vicious circle of "introduction-degradation-re-introduction-re-degradation".
How to "out of the circle"?
What are the "stuck necks" of livestock and poultry?
The Beijing News reporters chatted with experts who have been with the industry for 10, 20, and 30 years to grow together.
Live pig breeding: the situation must change when introducing more importantly than selecting breeding
People seldom pay attention to pork as much as it is now, it has soared and fallen, and the news is always constant.
In fact, prices can only reflect the relationship between supply and demand, and breeding can determine the real destiny of the industry.
In the field of pig breeding in my country, more problems are concentrated in the lack of independent technological innovation capabilities of domestic pig breeds.
Zhu Zengyong, a researcher at the Beijing Institute of Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Medicine of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, believes that “breeding is actually a process of intensifying genetic selection based on industrial needs to improve pig performance after introduction.” Zhu Zengyong said that my country has now established its own breeding. The system, only in terms of production efficiency, is still lower than European and American varieties.
Zhu Zengyong cites the parameter “the number of commercial pigs provided by each sow” as an example. “In 2017, this number has reached 33 in Denmark, and in Germany it has reached more than 28, while the domestic average level is 17- Between 18 heads."
The reasons for this gap are the relatively late start of pig breeding in my country and the lack of original research. Zhu Zengyong believes that my country's pig companies are unwilling to cultivate independently, and the trust between companies is insufficient, which also hinders the development of domestic pig breeding.
“Breeding requires continuous R&D investment. Some companies are eager to seize market dividends and increase the frequency of introducing foreign breeds when the price of pigs is high. However, they often simply expand by introducing breeds and do not focus on breed selection. Keep it up and keep doing it for a long time."
White Feather Broiler: The only breed that is completely dependent on imports
Last week, the first 2021 International Livestock and Poultry Seed Industry Technology Innovation Summit was held in Nanchang. At the meeting, it was mentioned that efforts should be made to achieve a breakthrough in white feather broiler breeds "from 0 to 1."
Zhao Guiping, a researcher at the Beijing Institute of Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Medicine of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, was there at the time, and what the meeting emphasized was Zhao Guiping’s most important work.
The livestock and poultry breeding industry has been with Zhao Guiping for nearly 30 years.
In 1992, Zhao Guiping, who graduated from university, started raising imported white feather broilers in a national breeding company.
This large-scale broiler, which has been introduced to China since the 1980s, is more suitable for industrial production than the traditional yellow-feathered broiler in my country.
After graduating from graduate school, Zhao Guiping worked in the breeding team of the Institute of Animal Husbandry, Academy of Agricultural Sciences, and has been dealing with white feather broilers for too many years.
The same is for livestock and poultry breeding. To improve the domestic core breeds of pigs, only 10% of the provenance needs to be introduced, and then cross-breeding is done.
"But white-feather broilers cannot be improved by a small amount of introduction, and it is impossible to introduce pure-line provenance. At present, the domestically introduced white-feather broilers are the production herd of white-feather broilers. After this ancestor-generation chicken is introduced back, it is used for production and cannot be bred. For live pigs, the core group can be renewed by buying 10% each year, while broiler chickens need to be imported 100%, and the amount is huge." Zhao Guiping said.
White-feather broiler is currently the only breed in China's livestock and poultry field that is entirely dependent on imports.
Zhao Guiping said that the introduction of foreign seed sources for a long time has restricted the supply of domestic white feather broilers, which has a great impact on the downstream production of the industry.
Due to the complete dependence on imports, the pricing power of white feather broilers is completely monopolized by foreign countries, and at the same time, the safety of seed sources cannot be absolutely guaranteed.
In these senses, my country has been passive in this field for a long time. In Zhao Guiping's view, the provenance problem of white feather broilers is really "stuck in the neck".
Beef cattle breeding: 20 years of breeding history is just beginning
Compared with live pigs and broilers, my country's beef cattle industry started later.
Until the end of the Qing Dynasty, the folks in our country did not have the habit of eating beef. The real beef cattle industry finally started in the 1990s. Since there was no beef cattle breed of its own, in order to meet market demand, the cattle used in stock were still used.
According to Li Junya, chief scientist of the cattle genetic breeding innovation team of the Institute of Animal Husbandry, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, the history of beef cattle breeding in my country has only been 20 years, and the breeding data is far inferior to the accumulation of hundreds of years abroad.
Time went back 20 years. It was the beginning of 2000. Zhang Qingyun, a native of Shandong, worked at the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences for 7 years, and finally chose to return to his hometown to start a business in the direction of animal husbandry.
He is 65 years old this year. He has worked in the army and studied medicine. He has no experience in the seed industry. However, Shandong Kelong Animal Husbandry Industry Co., Ltd., which he founded is among the top beef production in the country, is owned by the Ministry of Agriculture. In 2008, the first batch of national-level preservation farms were determined.
Qinchuan cattle, Jinnan cattle, Nanyang cattle, Luxi cattle, and Yanbian cattle are known as China’s top five fine-bred cattle breeds.
Located in Liangshan County, Jining, Shandong Province, this national-level breeding farm is conserving Luxi cattle.
Zhang Qingyun said that this breed is characterized by stable genetic performance, dual use of slaughter meat, and tender meat. At the same time, the traditional Luxi yellow cattle also have weaknesses such as slow growth and low weight gain.
In my country's total beef, the vast majority of the proportion comes from the hybrid cattle of scalpers and foreign beef cattle breeds.
Zhang Qingyun's company also has varieties from abroad, but the introduced varieties will not be used for cross breeding.
"We will only refer to the situation of foreign varieties and improve local varieties." Zhang Qingyun also talked about the strange circle of "introduction, degradation, re-introduction, and degeneration". "This is because the best foreign germplasm resources are impossible to give us. The reality is that we all understand that the prospects for breeding are very good, but it is very difficult for private enterprises to grow bigger and stronger, and the capital investment is too large."
Those bumps on the road of time-consuming and labor-intensive livestock breeding
In fact, Zhu Zengyong, a researcher at the Beijing Institute of Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Medicine, did not participate in the breeding work, and agricultural economics was his original major.
When Zhu Zengyong started economic research on the livestock industry 11 years ago, he didn’t know anything about the seed industry at first, and he even couldn’t figure out the level of the original species of livestock and poultry including great grandparents, parental generations, and commercial generations. "Eggs and chicks", he said that he had made a joke at first because he couldn't break sentences.
Many years later, Zhu Zengyong, who is engaged in the research of animal husbandry industry economy and market early warning, is also more like a bystander of the development of domestic livestock and poultry breeding.
"Breeding itself is a very hard work, time-consuming and labor-intensive, and you have to endure loneliness. But this does not mean that you have endured the hardships, endured loneliness, and bred new varieties, even if it is successful. Because new varieties will eventually need to accept the market’s choice."
The cruel thing is that the accumulation of time and the recording of large amounts of data often do not lead to success.
Bottlenecks in the scientific research process are always annoying.
Some of the bottlenecks are technically difficult to overcome. "For example, a variety we cultivated before, the feed-to-meat ratio has never been lowered, and it is 0.2 or 0.3 worse than foreign countries. But you should know that you hope that the variety that is widely used in production will come. Say, it’s just a little bit, and the gap is huge."
Some bottlenecks come from capital investment. “For example, in order to improve breeding conditions and strengthen epidemic prevention measures, some companies will reinvest in new breeding farms. When this plant is built, it will cost 240 million yuan. But for breeding, the investment is so More funds, but it's just the beginning."
Other bottlenecks stem from pressure and barriers imposed by foreign countries.
Zhao Guiping mentioned that after a well-known domestic company announced independent breeding, it was cut off by foreign seed source companies. "In other words, foreign companies no longer sell any products to this company. The company must complete the research and development of the variety by itself. In order to maintain production."
Production, education, research, and science-enterprise cooperation in breeding must be improved
When talking about the most important aspects in the breeding process, experts all mentioned the lack of equipment and R&D investment.
Zhang Qingyun has always felt that digging and protecting local species and taking advantage of superior breeds is the key to breaking the problem of domestic beef cattle stuck necks.
In his view, the problem lies in the backward technology, application and investment, rather than the inherent disadvantages of local varieties.
Zhu Zengyong mentioned that there are two main types of pig breeding systems in my country. "Compared with foreign countries, there is still a big gap between the corresponding whole-genome breeding technology of pig breeding companies and foreign countries, and the breeding sections of large companies are mostly dependent on corporate breeding services. , The status is very marginal."
"A large number of researchers study technology in universities, but a large number of breeding companies have a very low level of application of new technologies. This is also a problem that has not been solved." Zhao Guiping and Zhu Zengyong both talked about the cooperation between science, technology and enterprises in terms of production, education and research. In terms of mechanism, there is still a lot of room for improvement.
Beijing News reporter Tian Jiexiong