China defends hillside rice farming as country pushes to guarantee food security

Agriculture ministry says controversial research on growing the crop in mountainous areas is worth pursuing, though critics warn it erodes the soil

Beijing aims to create new arable land as worsening ties with West and war in Ukraine pose risk to food supply

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Agricultural expert Zhu Youyong has developed rice varieties that can grow in dry farmland instead of flooded paddy fields. Photo: Xinhua

Published: 7:00pm, 25 Jun 2023

Chinese agricultural authorities have defended controversial research on growing rice in mountainous areas, saying the country must make full use of hillside land to ensure food security.

In an article in its official newspaper Farmers’ Daily on Friday, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs said hillside cultivation of rice, China’s most important staple food, was worth exploring despite lower yields and higher costs.

“At present, in order to guarantee food security, we not only need to grow crops on such land, but make sure to grow them well,” an unnamed ministry official from a land protection centre was quoted as saying.

The comments were in response to criticism of Zhu Youyong, a member of the China Academy of Engineering, who has developed rice varieties that can grow in dry farmland instead of flooded paddy fields.

Zhu has suggested that such varieties could be grown on hillsides, which account for about 22 per cent of the country’s farmland.

His experiments have been carried out in mountainous areas in Yunnan province in the country’s southwest.