Sanya shines as China seed capital

APSA advocates for seed R&D at 6th national seed conference

HAINAN: APSA executives advocated for stronger cooperation and investment in plant breeding innovation and seed R&D during China’s annual seed conference mid-March.

More than 2000 delegates from China and abroad partook in the 6th iteration of the China Seed Congress, held 16-20 March.

The APSA delegation included Honorary Life Member, Dr. Mengyu Zhang, Past president, Mr. Zhiping Wang, past EC member Dr. Dehua Ma and Chinese member representatives from around 30 companies including Celestial Seeds, Wuhan Qingfa-hesheng Seed, Shanghai Wells Seed, Winall Hi-Tech Seed, Syngenta Group China, Wuhan Yafei Seed, Huasheng Seed Group, CNUS Vegetable seed, Wenzhou Shenlu Seed, Zhejiang Sky Good Seeds etc.

Dubbed the Nanfan Agricultural Silicon Valley, the city of Sanya is a strategic seed research and production hub on the southern Chinese subtropical island and province of Hainan.

Organized by the China Seed Association (CSA) during its first two years (2018 and 2019) in Beijing, the annual nationallevel conference was cancelled in 2020 due to Covid-19, and re-established in 2021 as an in-person meeting at its new permanent home in Sanya.

The agenda has assembled various provincial and ministerial agricultural officers, academicians, as well as representatives of international associations including APSA, the International Seed Federation (ISF), International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV), and American Seed Trade Association (ASTA) to present everything from germplasm resource protection, and plant breeding to and international cooperation, among others.

Presenting during the Plant Breeding Innovation Round Table sub-forum on March 18, Ms Sayoc advocated for consistent and science-based policies around genome editing in order to encourage further investment in seed breeding and R&D in the Asia-Pacific.

Though the region is one of the most attractive regions in terms of investment and growth potential, particularly for sub-tropical and tropical crop seeds, the APSA director said there is still plenty of room for investment in the discovery of traits and breakthrough innovations, a need that is magnified by a growing threat of pests and diseases.

But there needs to be clarity, consistency and predictability in the regulatory framework to support this investment.

“We want to encourage seed companies to invest in innovations to take advantage of the window of opportunity and the momentum that exists in the APAC market,” she said. “We need innovations here and now to address emerging diseases and increasing environmental pressures experienced by farmers. But for this to happen, regulation must be in tune with the pace of evolution in science, business, and society.”

Some 2,500 participants attended the annual event, which featured 15 symposia, a venue area of about 17,542 square meters and an exhibition area of about 6,400 square meters. Exhibition areas exhibited achievements made in the seed industry and industrial chain, and products of seed enterprises.

There were both indoor exhibitions and outdoor crop variety displays, with indoor exhibition space exceeding 5,000 square meters and focusing on the development of Sanya’s Yazhou Bay Science and Technology City as well as other achievements and innovations of over 40 featured companies and institutions.

The outdoor crop variety displays were located in the National Modern Agriculture (Seed Industry) Industrial Park in Sanya, and included over 2,200 crop varieties from both China and all around the world.

This event brought together nearly 200 distinguished reporting guests as well as industry elites including ten academicians of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and eight chief scientists of the national industry technology system.

Guests were invited to exchange foundational results achieved by the seed industry revitalization campaign over the past three years, as well as to discuss the future development of the Nanfan Silicon Valley, an agricultural base taking advantage of Hainan's tropical climate to intensively develop new seed varieties.

In addition, there were a variety of related events allowing the public to taste and evaluate many of Hainan’s agricultural products, including chili peppers, corn, squash, tomatoes, and other featured produce varieties, with reports presented at the event’s keynote speech on the 17th.