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At the end of October, a group of representatives of companies participating in the potato market, wishing to evaluate the achievements and prospects of the specialized sub-industry in the Middle Kingdom, went on a week-long trip to China, organized by the Potato System magazine and Agrotrade Group of Companies with the support of the POTATOES NEWS portal.
Ramil Idiatullin, executive director of Agrofirm “Glory to Potatoes” LLC
– I work for a seed company, so for me the most important points in the business program were a visit to the Seed Selection Center and the potato industry exhibition. I expected to see the technologies and equipment of the future. Perhaps because immediately upon arriving in the country we immediately felt like we were in an advanced country. For example, all residents of the country used WeChat - this is an application that is a social network, a messenger, and a trading platform - a universal assistant for all occasions. There were a lot of electric cars on the streets (by the way, ordinary Chinese cars were less common than on our roads).
But it turned out that Chinese seed growers do not focus on introducing innovations, but on maximizing simplification and reduction in cost of production of starting material.
At the Selection and Seed Center we observed the process of microplant cuttings. Before our eyes, the specialist simply cut the plants with scissors and poured portions into a jar with a nutrient medium. For comparison, in our case, installing a plant in an environment is a complex, lengthy process where every millimeter is important.
Of course, it's all about production volumes. We were told that the center produces about 200 million units. mini tubers per year. Our company receives 500 thousand units, this is 400 times less, while their staff is about 10 times larger than ours. But quality issues with their approach objectively do not even fade into the background.
There was nothing exceptional at the potato technology exhibition either. We thought that the stands would feature huge wide-cut units, like in America. But the country that produces the largest volume of potatoes in the world does so with small tractors and trailed equipment. The level of mechanization and automation of processes is the same as in Russia 15-20 years ago, there is a lot of manual labor. In retail chains, potatoes are laid out like our mangoes, each tuber in a special net.
Overall, the trip was an interesting experience, and I am grateful for its organization by the Agrotrade Group of Companies and the editors of the Potato System magazine. It will be interesting to go to China again; first of all, I am interested in the large exhibition in Wuhan, which has not been held in recent years due to the pandemic.