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New cotton strain to raise output by 25%

www.chinanews.cn 2005-09-19 09:41:53

(Source: China Daily)

Sept. 19 - A major cotton breeding breakthrough has made China the first
country in the world to commercialize a cotton strain that can resist
bollworms and increase output by 25 per cent.
The milestone advancement was pioneered by scientist Guo Sandui and his
team at the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences. The breakthrough
won wide acclaim from officials and experts over the weekend.
Building on his success of insect-resistant, genetically-modified cotton,
of which 2.3 million hectares was planted this year, Guo's research team
in 1999 started to work out a molecular breeding system for hybrid cotton.
After years of hard work, Guo, the "father of Chinese Bt transgenetic
cotton," was able to have his "Yinmian 2" cotton strain approved by the
National Crop Cultivar Assessment Committee, which gave the go-ahead for
its commercialization, according to the Ministry of Agriculture.
The "three-line hybrid cotton with insect-resistant gene," if planted on
the 3.33 million hectares of land where it is fit to grow, will
theoretically increase output by 1 million tons each year.
That amounts to what conventional strains may be able to yield on 666,600
hectares, which is the equivalent size of all the cotton fields in the
Yangtze River Delta, a leading cotton producer in China, Vice-Minister of
Agriculture Fan Xiaojian said on Saturday.
Compared with his "hybrid rice" which promises to increase grain output
by up to 20 per cent, Yuan said Guo's hybrid cotton is well on course to
increase output by 30 per cent in the years to come.
The senior scientist urged the ministries of agriculture, science and
technology as well as the National Development and Reform Commission to
shore up investment and spread the technology nationwide to benefit
farmers.

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