International cooperation can solve agricultural challenges

China can intensify international cooperation in agriculture to solve challenges facing its food security, a vice-president of the Chinese Academy of Engineering said on Friday.

With an annual production of crops amounting to more than 600 million metric tons, Chinese have enough to eat, but the agricultural sector in general faces challenges such as decreasing farmland, lack of water resources, and food safety concerns caused by environmental pollution, Liu Xu said at an international conference hosted by the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences on Friday.

However, with China's population increasing, it is estimated that demand for food will grow at an annual rate of at least 1 percent for the next 20 years, he said.

"Improving imports and exports of agricultural products can help China relieve the pressure to ensure food security and sustainable agricultural development," he said.

Domestic production of agricultural products such as rice, wheat, vegetables and fruits can meet more than 95 percent of China's total demand, but other major projects, such as dairy and soybeans, will continue to depend heavily on imports, he said.

Feng Haifa, chief of the economics research department at the CPC Central Committee Policy Research Office, said that with rising living standards, Chinese people have increasingly demanded better quality products that can be met by increased imports.

"Over the long term, we should continue to increase imported agricultural products that are lacking domestically, those of high quality and higher value," he said.

"Meanwhile, we should try to improve supervision and management over agriculture to change individual household-based farming into a sizable and profit-driven business model, to increase the export of products where we excel."

Nie Fengying, deputy director of the Center for International Agricultural Research, CAAS, said the Belt and Road Initiative offers China great opportunities for international agricultural cooperation.

China will continue to promote the opening up of its agricultural sector and intensify international cooperation in agriculture, said Gu Weibing, chief for legal affairs at the Ministry of Agriculture's international cooperation bureau.

By the end of last year, Chinese enterprises had invested in agriculture in 105 countries and regions, with a total investment of 180 billion yuan ($27 billion) in more than 500 major projects, Gu said.