China Railway 20th Bureau Group Corp, or CR20G－a subsidiary of State-owned China Railway Construction Corp Ltd, is being hailed for its role in supporting Mozambican agriculture.
Guo Wei, CR20G’s country head for Mozambique operations, said that by the end of June, the project completed harvesting rice for the 2020-21 planting season, with a harvested area of 36,000 mu (2,400 hectares), yielding 16,600 metric tons of rice. All of the rice from the harvest has been sold in local markets, he added.
Backed by the China-Africa Development Fund, CR20G built a rice processing plant in Xai-Xai, capital of Gaza province, Mozambique, in 2017. The company has been running this project, China’s largest rice planting project on the continent, for more than four years.
Hainan Boosts Tropical Agriculture Ties With Mozambique and Other African Countries
According to officials, China Railway 20th Bureau Group Corp, or CR20G－a subsidiary of State-owned China Railway Construction Corp Ltd－has helped farmers in its markets in Mozambique and other African nations achieve stable and high yields by introducing China’s practical agricultural technologies, conducting related services and applying modern machinery for more than half a decade.
Speaking at a conference on prospects for China-Africa agriculture ties, Zhang Jianping, director-general of the China Center for Regional Economic Cooperation in Beijing, said China’s growing outbound direct investment in high-end manufacturing, agriculture, digital and innovation businesses is likely to lead a new round of “going global” for domestic companies.
Nie Fengying, deputy director of the Agricultural Information Institute of Beijing-based Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, said that based on the institute’s latest study, both the output and consumption of various grain and livestock products in China will continue to increase over the next 15 years.
“China’s imports of rice, soybeans, beef and dairy products will grow during this period, while imports of wheat, corn, pork and poultry will decline,” said Nie, quoted by Xinhua.
China saw imports of agricultural products surge 12.3 percent to 1.07 trillion yuan (USD 167.67 billion) in the first three quarters, including 160.79 billion yuan worth of meat and 102.08 billion yuan worth of grain, said the General Administration of Customs.
Peng Yanjun, deputy director-general of the department of international cooperation at the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs said that because the increasingly complex international investment environment has presented more difficulties for domestic companies to pursue “going global” strategies, trade in agricultural services is a practical option to meet Chinese firms’ demand to invest in overseas agricultural projects.
By providing full-process solutions for agricultural production in other parts of the world, this move will drive China’s products, funds and technologies to be used overseas and expand the supply of staple foods as well as promote the upgrading of agricultural production in host countries, Peng added.
