Recently, Xiong Hang, the professor at Huazhong Agricultural University's School of Economics and Management and vice president of Huazhong Agricultural University's Macro Agricultural Research Institute, accepted an exclusive interview with China Daily on this issue.
Xiong Hang stated that at present, artificial intelligence, big data and other emerging technologies are transforming agriculture with unprecedented efforts, not only greatly improving the efficiency of agricultural production operations, but also promoting the transformation of agricultural business decision-making from experience-based decision-making to data-driven intelligent decision-making. "In the context of agricultural and rural digitization and intelligence, it is just the right time for China to accelerate the construction of a strong agricultural country." Xiong Hang believes that more attention needs to be paid at the moment to make up for the key scientific and technological shortboards, stimulate the vitality of all kinds of factors, and strive to enhance the international competitiveness of Chinese agriculture.
Xiong Hang: the development of agriculture has always supported by progress in science and technology, since the founding of the country, China's agriculture has experienced from mechanization to information technology, and then to the intelligent development of the course. At present, there is an obvious gap between China and the world's agricultural science and technology powerhouse, we must accelerate to make up for the short boards to achieve a high level of agricultural science and technology self-reliance and self-improvement. In recent years, China's agricultural science and technology innovation capacity has been steadily improving, but there are disparities in areas such as core seed sources and advanced equipment. Make up for the short board on China's agricultural science and technology to respect the characteristics of agriculture, for key areas of agricultural basic research to provide long-term, ongoing support. Strengthen the basic research conditions of agriculture-related universities and institutes to build a scientific and technological innovation platform system that matches the discipline system, to create conditions for sustained basic and cutting-edge research.
It is worth noting that agricultural software (model) is a weak link in the process of agricultural intelligence in China. Agricultural models are the kernel of intelligent decision-making decision support systems, yet models developed based on China's local conditions have obvious shortcomings in terms of both the rationality of the internal mechanism and the types and varieties of agricultural products covered. The government needs to increase investment in basic research in the field of agricultural science and technology, set up a special program for the research and development of agricultural models, and at the same time vigorously cultivate students with both knowledge of agriculture and strong modeling ability.
China Daily: Emerging technologies represented by artificial intelligence and big data are rapidly penetrating all industries, and agriculture is no exception. How to stimulate the vitality of all kinds of factors, including talent, technology and data?
Xiong Hang: The key to breakthroughs in critical core technologies lies in effectively utilizing the enthusiasm of researchers. At present, the enthusiasm of agricultural researchers to carry out original scientific and technological innovation and results transformation has not been fully stimulated. It is necessary to implement the distribution policy oriented to increase the value of knowledge, to build a remuneration system and income growth mechanism that reflects the value of intellectual labor, and to open up the "last kilometer" of the transformation of agricultural scientific and technological achievements.
With the vigorous development of the digital economy, data resources have gradually become an important factor of production. First of all, it is necessary to establish a system for data elements to participate in the distribution of agricultural production and management results. Only when the distribution mechanism for data owners to participate in the profits of agricultural production and management is established can we widely and continuously mobilize all kinds of agricultural participants to obtain and provide high-quality data, and fully utilize the data to create value. In addition, not only to revitalize the stock but also to optimize the increment, to build an agricultural knowledge map to open up the information "island". The first step is to realize logical interconnection between data without changing the ownership and management pattern of existing data resources, establish a sharing and exchange mechanism for agricultural and rural government information resources, and then interoperate with the data of industrial enterprises and scientific research institutions.
China Daily: How to enhance the international competitiveness of Chinese agriculture?
Xiong Hang: As the world's largest producer of agricultural products and an important importer and exporter of agricultural products, improving the international competitiveness of agriculture is a key issue in the construction of an agricultural powerhouse in China. On the one hand, it is necessary to optimize the structure of import and export of agricultural products, and improve the ability to cope with international market shocks and emergencies. In order to ensure that the initiative of future food security is firmly in their own hands, it is necessary to grasp the domestic demand for agricultural products in a multi-dimensional range, timely analysis of the domestic consumption structure of agricultural products, and predict the trend of consumption of agricultural products, and moderately expand the immediate needs of food and agricultural raw materials imports, and to promote imports of high-quality agricultural products, to meet China's food consumption market and the diversified needs of food consumption. In-depth implementation of the strategy of diversification of agricultural imports to cope with the current global epidemic, climate change, Russia-Ukraine conflict on food security, increase the types of agricultural imports, expanding China's agricultural import channels, multi-channel to protect China's food security.
On the other hand, it is necessary to draw on the development experience of large agricultural import-export countries to explore the implementation of a more proactive food security policy. In addition, there is a need to further strengthen agricultural cooperation among countries along the Belt and Road. It is necessary to strengthen the strategic docking of agricultural cooperation among countries along the Belt and Road, take into account the interests and demands of all parties, support the facilitation of import and export trade, further optimize import and export trade measures, and eliminate trade barriers. At the same time, with agricultural science and technology exchanges and cooperation as a guide, we will deepen agricultural trade and investment cooperation in the six major economic corridors of the New Asia-Europe Continental Bridge, China-Mongolia-Russia, China-Central Asia-West Asia, China-Central Asia-South China Peninsula, China-Pakistan, and Bangladesh-China-India-Myanmar.
https://hb.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202305/04/WS645346e8a310537989372aa8.html
