A recently published Chinese government document has outlined targets for rural development and agricultural production for 2023. The document calls for enhanced efforts to stabilise production and ensure the supply of grain and important agricultural products, to accelerate the construction of agricultural infrastructure, to strengthen support for agricultural science, technology, and equipment, to consolidate and expand the achievements of poverty alleviation, and to promote the high-quality development of rural industries.

Within this, annual grain production is targeted at over 650 million tonnes to help ensure the stable production and adequate supply of grain and other important agricultural products. The document states this will be achieved via area expansion of soybean and oil crops, as well as developing modern facility agriculture.

Other aspects of the document include upgrading basic farmland to high-quality farmland, developing observation stations and field research facilities, completing the national germplasm census and developing advanced agricultural machinery.

However, despite the recently published targets, China is expected to plant less than 1% of its maize fields with GM varieties. The country recently approved the cultivation of GM varieties (see AgbioNews Jan 14, 2022). According to reports, approximately 267,000 hectares will be designated for GM maize in Inner Mongolia, Jilin, Hebei and Yunan provinces. The total planted area for maize in the country last year was estimated at 43.3 million hectares.