A legendary past in the seed world
In 2011, security guards at DuPon, a U.S. seed company, spotted several Chinese men sprawled out in a corn field, doing something sneaky. The security guard saw that this was not right and then reported the incident.
After that, the investigation department can not only the local police, the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) directly to follow up on the matter.
The results of the subsequent investigation also confirmed that these people were not unable to find the toilet in the field, but in the theft of corn seed.
After apprehending the mastermind behind this, the U.S. found that this was not a theft on a whim; the mastermind had been planning for more than five years in order to steal the seeds. And not only this Time in the corn field to steal seeds, before they also tried to more than two hundred pounds of corn seeds express back Home, and even once the stolen seeds hidden into popcorn boxes and Sebring napkins, from the United States human to airlift these seeds back home.
Later the protagonists of the incident pleaded guilty, stating that they did conspire and steal trade secrets from DuPont’s Pioneer Hi-Bred, Monsanto, and LG Seeds for a long time.
But are these giant seed companies the white knight victims? No, they’re not. Their backstabbing is even more vicious. The history of Monsanto, for example, is a history of human blood. The company developed the powerful herbicide glyphosate in 1970, which was found to be carcinogenic after forty years of global use. The company also invested in the research of genetically modified seeds, which controlled the agricultural production of many countries, such as Argentina.
In 1996, Argentina had just kicked off its financial crisis, and the entire country faced the dilemma of capital outflow. At this time, Monsanto gave Argentina a “big gift”: we provide very cheap soybean seeds, and the yield is also high, rather than large-scale sowing, immediately can be collected and sold to earn foreign exchange.
This looks like a lucrative business, of course, Argentina is happy. That very year, then-President Menem granted Monsanto a license to sell GMO soybean seed exclusively in Argentina. After large-scale industrial planting, Argentina’s economy boomed for a while thanks to soy exports.
But the national economy also entered into an unprecedented dilemma: In order to maximize profits, soybean planting became widespread throughout the country, and nearly half of the arable land began to be used for soybean production, resulting in a heavy dependence on foreign imports for other agricultural products, while the seeds provided by Monsanto could not be planted repeatedly and Argentina had to buy them again and again.
When Argentina had already planted soybeans, Monsanto said, “Hey, I’ve provided you with cheap seeds for years, it’s time to pay us royalties.
At first, of course, the Argentine farmers were reluctant, and then Monsanto started filing lawsuits in Europe, demanding that they pay royalties out of the soybeans they imported from Argentina. Naturally, Europe was reluctant, so they bought less Argentine soybeans, and the soybean farmers ended up losing a lot of money.
Some people feel that the increase in poverty and hunger in Argentina is due to the importation of genetically modified soybean seeds and the change in agricultural structure, which, in the first place, allowed itself to be trapped in a resource trap in order to make quick money with soybeans.
A similar story happened with cotton in India and Mexican corn. Those little seeds, in a cycle of several years of spring planting and summer growth, have stored up the power to change a country’s national fortunes.
Why did someone steal the seeds in the first place?
The question comes back, why do you think there are people who travel thousands of miles to steal seeds from abroad? To put it bluntly, to save time and money.
Take corn, in the past 60 years, the growth of global corn production, the contribution of the growth brought about by the single yield accounted for 70%, in other words, corn production is no longer by the enclosure, mainly by breeding.
But breeding is an extremely time-consuming and expensive task. Seed research and development to commercialization, mainly divided into four stages: research and development breeding, field seed production and seed processing, and finally marketing, the whole process down, it may take more than ten years, the scale of investment is also often tens of millions, and the benefits are unknown, there is a possibility of breeding failure.
The opportunity cost of running out so far to steal seeds is very high, but if successful, the revenue brought may be more than a billion, of course, the stolen party, may also lose more than a billion, and may even leak the country’s Food secrets, which is why, steal a corn seed, but alarmed the other side of the FBI.
Then the next question comes, what is the situation of China’s seeds?
For now, China is a net importer of seeds year-round, with seed imports of 66,000 tons and exports of 25,100 tons in 2019. Moreover, there is a high foreign dependence on many seeds.
The good thing is that for rice and wheat seeds, which are staple foods, China is steady in its technological core and produces its own seeds. But corn seeds, partly or by imports. For example, from the U.S. company DuPont’s “Centaur 335” around 2010 is China’s imported corn seeds in the explosion, occupying half of the northeast corn planting, a breeder once laughed at himself: “We do not have to engage in breeding, a ‘Centaur 335’ is enough.” Now, in the Northeast and the Yellow Huaihai, there are still many places planting “Centaur 355”.
Of course, this is just an example of corn. Beets, carrots, tomatoes, radishes, cabbage, potatoes, cucumbers, peppers, spinach, these indispensable vegetables in the daily Life of the Chinese people, seeds are not low foreign dependence.
Take sugar beet for example, China’s sugar beet seed market is basically divided by WS, Syngenta and SESVanderHave and other international seed companies. 2014 sugar beet seed imports were 346.12 tons, but in 2018, the import volume reached 1278.51 tons. Bai Chen, chief scientist of the national sugar industry technology system, said: at present, the genetic single seeds used for mechanized precision sowing basically all rely on imports, with a foreign dependence of more than 95%.
Bai Chen said that our country can also produce, but the germination rate is a bit lower, the processing link technology is backward, currently can not solve the problem.
So now we face the situation is: imported seeds every year, the price of their own seeds and can not, the other side want to sell how much to sell how much, there is no say, and sometimes buy the seeds are substandard, to fake. It takes two years to grow sugar beets, and when the seeds are found to be bad, the damage has already been done. Moreover, if there is a real political extreme, the whole industry will also face the risk.
Of course some people think that this is an exaggerated problem, if beet seeds are at risk, then it is good to import white sugar. But if we really encounter a big or small year, eating sugar may encounter a crisis. Now Brazil is the world’s top sugar exporter, every time the price of Crude Oil is high, Brazil will use sugar to make alcohol to go, if you encounter alcohol consumption year, said not to sell you sugar is not sold.
Similar problems, not only exist in the beet seeds, China’s potatoes, cabbage seeds are facing similar problems, this time can the country can not worry about it?
How can there be seeds foreign dependence?
In fact, China and at the time of Argentina, foreign seeds planted after the high yield, in order to promote the cheap sale, driven by the interests of gradually formed a dependence on foreign seeds, subject to the moment, but a lot.
In 2010, China’s imports of sweet pepper seeds, the buy-in price in the country is a hundred times the production cost of foreign companies, Israel’s tomato seeds and eggplant seeds from the Netherlands, the price per gram are more than 100 yuan, but because the quality is better than domestic seeds, farmers have no choice but to be forced to accept.
Foreign seed companies, after decades of development, have standardized the entire process and links of research and development, breeding, promotion and patent application, while China has shortcomings in all aspects. Take the most basic talent, read the breeding profession, many people have embarked on the road “to dissuade the siblings”.
Of course, this is a self-deprecating joke of the agronomy profession, can not be taken seriously, but some students do point out that there is too much difference between theory and practice. For example, data, foreign advanced seed companies, after designing experiments to break down the quantitative data of genotypes, China is still relying on the human experience and observation of breeders, rather like a kind of foreign guns and cannons to daggers and machetes taste; foreign excellent breeding company R & D department to form a professional team, extensive and in-depth research, China is still stuck in a small workshop level, generally a breeder with two small assistants, and then with the local farmers. The breeder starts to develop breeding, it is a cut above others; and in scientific research, the phenomenon of adulteration is too much, very often is to cross their own general seeds, and the best seeds imported from abroad, to make a kind of in not slippery, take to the trial, the result is actually the original optimal genes scattered. China’s certified seeds look like more and more, but many are low-end copies.
Breeding work scientific research investment is high and long, if companies do not have the financial strength, or the state to make investments, it is difficult to become a climate. According to the data of 2020, in 2019 the seed industry listed companies for research investment of more than 100 million yuan, R & D accounted for more than 10% of the enterprise only one. But the global seed giant Bayer, in 2019, said that the total amount of research investment in the next ten years will reach 25 billion euros. Compared with others, the difference between inside and outside is a thousand or eight hundred times.
Of course, these gaps are finally shown in the quality of seeds.
In 2016, Fujian Province, Fuzhou City, Fujian Province, Minqing County, Bai Zhong Yuan Feng Family farm in charge of Wang Yongyuan with all domestic seeds, but because the seeds are not stable, many pumpkin quality is not good, some indicators did not meet the standard, became a loss. Wait until 2017, Wang Yongyuan used imported, although the price is twice as high, but because the output quality is stable, and finally choose to import their own.
Some farmers also said that some domestic seeds are also okay, but the universality is not good, can be planted in the field, but change to the greenhouse will not work. Who else hates uncertainty more than farmers? The end result is the formation of dependence on foreign seeds.
Of course, there will be some excellent seeds in China, but there are still risks associated with sowing new seeds, and farmers tend to prefer seeds that are already widely planted with less risk.
The combination of all these reasons has led to a situation where some seeds are stuck in the neck.
The country also gradually recognized the seriousness of the problem
Document No. 1, the sword pointed at seeds
In 2020, the Central Economic Work Conference proposed to solve the problem of seeds and arable land, emphasizing the need to carry out the seeds “neck” technology research. On February 21 this year, before the end of the year, the country issued the Central Document No. 1, and clearly pointed out: to ensure food self-sufficiency and seed security. This time, the central government came out and seriously said to solve this problem.
Why mention seeds and arable land together? In fact, this is a problem that has plagued China’s agricultural development for a long time.
Preserving the red line of 1.8 billion mu of arable land has been implemented as a rigid target in China, and it is not easy to ensure that arable land is not occupied by real estate. An economics problem arises: arable land resources are limited, and the more a crop is grown, the more it will dump the amount of other crops cultivated.
Take the trade war neck of soybeans, these years because the soybean issue is more sensitive, so the country is also increasing production, soybean sowing area in 2020 increased by 8.25 million mu, reaching 148 million mu, but if China wants to achieve self-sufficiency in soybeans, still need 700 million mu of arable land, but to feed the people of the country, rice, wheat and corn cultivation area is necessary to have a guarantee, take so much It is impossible to take that much land to plant soybeans.
The end result is that long-term scientific research and human investment are focused on rice and wheat, the two major food varieties to achieve complete self-sufficiency, hybrid rice mu yield potential exceeded 1000 kg. But other crops can not get the resources, breeding capacity will not work. Finally, the embarrassing situation of either importing or importing seeds.
The main variables affecting crop yields on two: planting area and mu yield, in the case of planting area can not be expanded, now only on the seeds.
Of course, it is not that our own seeds are not good, there are many varieties but good, but in the past the level of awareness and foreign seed breeding companies are too far apart, ate a lot of losses. Once there was such a past.
In 2000, Monsanto visited China, and when the Chinese side was parting, out of courtesy and friendship, they gave each other a wild soybean, and at that time, the Chinese side did not even think about the result of giving this wild soybean. Monsanto’s staff received such a gift as a treasure, and then used such a seed to refine the “prolific gene” and “virus resistance” genes. Later, Monsanto applied for 64 international patents based on the research results of this soybean.
Later, we found out that our own native soybean plant breeding, but also infringement. The whole incident has now become a textbook lesson. The good thing is that China’s protection and Education of intellectual property rights have been progressing in the past two years, and similar incidents are becoming less and less common.
After witnessing and experiencing so many negative results of relying on foreign seeds, the country has also started to address these issues.
Ma Shuping, vice president of the China Seed Association, said in an interview in February that the entire seed industry will work toward the following areas: strengthening the collection, preservation and utilization of germplasm resources; improving the seed industry’s ability to innovate on its own; and cultivating core competitive enterprises. The state has also recently repeatedly stressed the need to ensure the safety of seeds.
The good thing is that once the state issued a document indicating that the shortcomings, the speed will certainly not be slow, China is also slowly reflecting on the past few years after recognizing the problem of seed dependence, corn independent selection of varieties planted area on back to 90%, the self-sufficiency rate of vegetable varieties is also slowly picking up. Three years ago, China National Chemical Corporation also spent $43 billion to acquire the Swiss Syngenta seed company.
The right thinking and attitude, the problem is solved sooner or later, I believe that China’s seed industry in the next few years will certainly have a long development.
Of course, the most hope is that our thinking and attitude, can always be correct, and if we encounter the wrong time, can also have the courage and ability to reflect and correct.
Recent Comments