Chinese farmers bolder in using agroecological approaches for crop health promotion

JINAN, June 16 (Xinhua) -- As the optimal wheat harvest period comes, veteran wheat grower Sun Dedong in east China's Shandong Province is not as worried as this time last year, when he first tried introducing agroecological approaches to his farming strategy.

Sun was skeptical about the so-called "natural enemy factory" approaches pitched by a team of agronomists from the Shandong Academy of Agricultural Sciences in 2022, but a year later he decided to support this green initiative aimed at agricultural pest control.

Ge Feng, head of the team of agronomists, explained to Sun that in their pest control research efforts, they ended up selecting wild fennel from more than 1,000 plants considered, as it releases volatiles which attract ladybugs and other natural enemies of wheat pests.

During the harvesting season, the waves of yellow wheat in Sun's fields are interspersed with rows of fennel plants, featuring green leaves and small white flowers on which ladybugs are densely packed.

"These plants are a 'natural enemy factory' in the wheat field, reducing the use of pesticide," said Sun, who manages 36,000 mu (2,400 hectares) of wheat fields in Changyi, Shandong, a major grain producer in China.

Sun revealed that he added 15,000 mu of fields for the agroecologically-friendly farming this year, up from the 1,000 mu used for his initial effort in 2023.

"Applying less pesticide helped me save 12 yuan (about 1.65 U.S. dollars) of cost per mu, and the crop can also sell at a slightly higher price," said the 61-year-old farmer.

Agricultural scientist Ge pointed out that although chemical insecticides are effective in killing pests, they also kill the pests' natural enemies, damage farmland ecosystems and aggravate pest resistance to insecticides.

He said through introducing the "natural enemy factory," the use of chemical insecticides has been reduced by 30 percent to 50 percent in pilot fields, compared with wheat fields managed in more traditional ways.

Currently, fennel-based agroecological approaches have been promoted across more than 100 million mu of farming areas nationwide, Ge said.

According to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, as of June 3, China had harvested 57 percent of its winter wheat, amounting to a total of 190 million mu.

Sun was happy to find out that wild fennel also has some extra economic value, as the plant is considered a medicinal herb that relieves cold symptoms and pains. Harvested fennel from his wheat fields can sell for more than 100 yuan per mu.