Chapter 49 Sowing
"Brilliant Seed Industry?" Guo Yang did not expect that Lao Xiang would recommend his former employer.
There shouldn’t be many people who would bring business to the old club!
Lao Xiang nodded calmly.
“According to the random inspection results of the Ministry of Agriculture, the quality of alfalfa seeds currently circulating in the northwest market is worrying, with a passing rate of only 40%.”
"The pass rate is so low?" Guo Yang was surprised.
“At present, the entire alfalfa seed production is in a scattered and disordered state. The technology is backward and the cleaning equipment is lacking. As a result, the seeds circulating on the market generally have poor purity.”
"The germination rate is low, the content of other plant seeds exceeds the standard, the quality is worrying, and fake and inferior seeds..."
"Huihuang Seed Industry, as a professional seed company, has its own production base and cleaning equipment, and its seeds The quality is still no problem.”
“In addition to Huihuang Seed Industry, Ning Province Oasis Grass Industry Co., Ltd. has also introduced alfalfa varieties from abroad in the past two years and established a 10,000-acre high-quality alfalfa seed production base. 20,000 acres of alfalfa production demonstration base”
Hearing this, Guo Yang was a little surprised.
"Are there quite a few professional alfalfa planting and production companies in China?"
In his memory, he knew that there was such a plant as alfalfa, or the 'baby milk powder' incident in 2008 after.
Lao Xiang shook his head.
“Compared to the expected domestic demand for high-quality forage in the future, there are not many companies.”
"And these are all enterprises founded around 2000. They are the first batch of 'pioneers' in the alfalfa industry. From the beginning, they have adhered to the path of specialization, scale and marketization."
"It's just that we can barely maintain operations at the moment, and the annual output of commercial alfalfa grass in Canada is less than 100,000 tons."
"Most companies are in a period of hesitation at this time."
Alfalfa is known as the "King of Pastures". It has high nutritional value and good palatability. It is the favorite and most economical pasture for various livestock.
The cultivated area of alfalfa in the world exceeds 600 million acres, but most of it is grown in developed countries. It is an important part of the "three-yuan" planting structure of agriculture, grain, economy and feed.
Taking the United States as an example, alfalfa is one of the four most widely planted crops in the United States, second only to corn, wheat and soybeans, with an annual output value of US$8.1 billion in 2001.
Alfalfa is commercially grown in all its continents, and seed production is carried out in more than 20 continents.
Canada, the country next door, has exported more than 3,000 tons of alfalfa seeds every year for more than ten consecutive years.
In addition to being used for traditional animal feeding, alfalfa can also be used as biofuel to generate electricity, or its high nitrogen content can be used for soil biological improvement, and it can also be used for industrial production of enzymes. .
In my country, alfalfa seed production is mainly concentrated in Long Province, Shaanxi Province, Ning Province, Mongolia Province, Xinjiang Province, Shandong Province and other places.
There is an obvious relationship between seed yield and region. The alfalfa seed yield in the northwest irrigation area is high and of good quality, which is suitable for seed production.
Long Province has always been the province with the largest alfalfa planting area in my country, accounting for about one-third of my country's alfalfa planting area for a long time.
The planting area in 1998 was approximately 5.6 million acres, and by 2023, this figure will be more than 12 million acres.
But at this time, companies and growers mostly planted alfalfa to meet their own needs and basically did not enter the market.
When Guo Yang learned that Huihuang Seed Industry was in trouble, he thought about acquiring it and then follow the trend from pasture to enter the seed industry.
But it failed in the end.
At this time, the thought of buying alfalfa seeds from Huihuang Seed Industry is inevitably a bit strange.
“Then with our order of 1 million kilograms of alfalfa seeds, will the operating conditions of Huihuang and Oasis Grass Industry get much better?”
Lao Xiang thought for a moment and gave the answer. Answered in the affirmative.
Guo Yang felt very conflicted at this time, mainly because he still had the idea of acquiring Huihuang Seed Industry in the future. In addition, he knows that the domestic grass industry has just emerged, the market for grass products is still small, there are still few farms and feed mills that can purchase alfalfa products, and the profits of grass products are also low.
Huihuang Seed Industry and Oasis Grass Industry both have their own alfalfa planting and processing industry chains. Does Alfalfa's purchase of their seeds count as a disguised enemy?
But after thinking carefully for a while, Guo Yang decided to purchase alfalfa seeds produced by professional companies such as Huihuang and Oasis.
The purpose of planting alfalfa is to improve the saline-alkali land and obtain natural energy to buy seeds. The alfalfa industry is just a stepping stone.
And he knows that in the next few years, with the growth of residents' income, changes in consumption habits, and the expansion of consumer groups, my country's production and consumption of meat, eggs, and milk will grow rapidly.
As a basic industry, the grass industry will definitely usher in vigorous development!
And abroad, the small country with a small territory is the country that imports the largest amount of grass products in the world. South Korea and some countries in Southeast Asia are also traditional importers of alfalfa products.
Although we are facing many difficulties now, the future market is vast!
After figuring it out, Guo Yang asked Lao Xiang to contact Huihuang and Oasis Grass Industry first.
And before leaving, he handed 100 pounds of ‘Alfalfa No. 1’ seeds to Lao Xiang.
...
Three days later, the seed field will be expanded.
After careful preparation by the workers, the entire field has been extremely leveled, and the soil, stones and weed roots have also been cleaned up.
The soil that was too loose after deep plowing in the early stage was suppressed by raking 2 to 3 times, so that the soil layer sank, meeting the requirement of virtual top and solid bottom, and the loose soil layer basically did not exceed 3cm.
This will facilitate the emergence of seeds and reduce evaporation of water in the lower soil.
At this time, Lao Xiang also distributed the original seeds of ‘Alfalfa No. 1’ that had been exposed to the sun for three days to the workers.
Generally speaking, the sowing materials produced in seed production fields should be original seeds or original seeds, and there are requirements for selection purity, germination rate, net weight, hardness rate, etc.
But the original seed of ‘Alfalfa No. 1’ is provided by the seed store, so there is no problem.
After discussion between Guo Yang and Lao Xiang, hole sowing was finally chosen as the sowing method, with a sowing depth of 1-1.5cm.
The seeds are too small and if sown too deep, germination will be affected and yield will be directly affected.
As for the amount of seeds used, according to Lao Xiang, when the soil fertility and irrigation conditions are relatively good, the average density of alfalfa growth in the second year is 2,000 plants/acre.
It should not be too thick, and the thinner it is, the better.
To achieve this density, the amount of seed used per acre is just about 1 jin, which is enough to sow 100 acres of seed fields.
In addition, the sowing density can also be controlled through various management measures such as thinning, fertilization, and irrigation in the later stage.
Just because of the preciousness of 'Alfalfa No. 1', Guo Yang would rather spend more time on manual transplanting if it is too dense in the later stage.
After the seeds are sown, the seed field is lightly suppressed again to tightly combine the soil with the soil, which is beneficial to the seeds' water absorption and germination and prevents root hanging.
Then the planting water was poured.
At this moment, the cell phone in Guo Yang's pocket rang.
After the call was connected, Yu Honghai’s loud voice was heard.
“Brother Guo, your Fendt 930 has arrived at the port. I will ship it to you soon!”
"I want to come to your base this time to have a look. You have to treat me well. It took a lot of effort for me to get the Fendt 930 and the complete set of Claas silage machinery."
(This chapter End)