China and Brazil grow their agricultural ties

[00:00:00]This is what Brazil sends to China.

[00:00:02]Grains by the millions of tons. Up to a quarter of everything China imports as food is now sourced in Brazil. Soybeans make up the largest portion produced by largecale investment intensive farms.

[00:00:14]For example, here in Parani state in the south of the country. At Embraa Soy Bean Research Center, scientists are continuously working to improve the yields and the quality of Brazilian grains. In the 70s, our average production in Brazil was 1,500 kilograms per hectar. Today, the national average is 3,500.

[00:00:37]How we did that? How we make this uh gene combinations in the soybean genome?

[00:00:42]How we improve that in a tropical region? So, that's the are some of the interests of the Chinese because they want to improve their production as well. The latest developments are coming from labs like this where researchers manipulate soybean DNA to push the next gains. The research leader says they have shared their experimental and practical knowledge of the plants with visitors from the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences who brought the latest advances in gene editing >> in our area especially biotechnology, gene editing. Chinese is a leader in these kind of tools uh to introduce precise modifications in the DNA of the soybean plants to improve and modify different traits increase the yield uh increase drought tolerance to introduce tolerance to disease. visiting researchers come to Emra and other Brazilian centers for joint work like ZCTN who is now back in China and spoke to us from there.

[00:01:45]>> I think this kind of collaboration between China and Brazil and Latin America that's very important for the the global food security. I think this is the main point. Brazil became a huge exporter of agricultural commodities such as soybeans and corn thanks to massive investment in agricultural technology. But this has mainly to do with largecale farming. There is now a growing effort to bring science and technology to small farmers as well and China has been playing an important role in that.

[00:02:21]>> Brazil doesn't have too much technology for small farms. I mean Embraa is doing lots of effort on that but Chinese have been doing for longer a long time. So we can have a better speed up our process here with this kind of partnerships to develop for example equipments and sensors and uh technology for for small farms. At the small farmer settlement run by Brazil's landless workers movement, farmers like Fernando Japala are waiting for new equipment expected to arrive under a cooperation agreement with a Chinese agricultural machinery company. A similar project has already been put in place in the country's northeast. Smallcale farming machines including some high-tech equipment like this drone sent for use by small farmers.

[00:03:15]Looking at our planting at our fields, we end up losing a lot for lack of technology. Spraying products with a drone for example, we wouldn't have that waste where you pass over with the tractor. Brazil's science ministry has already signed a deal with China to incorporate artificial intelligence technology for family farming planned to reach fields like this. Brazil's grain boom was centered on be growers. The push now is to spread the benefits of that technology to producers of all sizes. Paulo Cabra, CGTN, Lrina, Brazil.