Agricultural System
Overview

Widely considered as one of the most important stage developments in human history, agriculture originated between 10,000 and 8,000 years ago. The two dominating crops in ancient China were rice and millet: rice was grown primarily in the south, where the warm and wet climate were suitable to the growing conditions of rice, while millet was grown in the north, where it was drier and cooler. Other northern crops include wheat, barley and sweet potatoes, while other southern crops include soy beans and garlic. 

 

At first, farming in China was extremely labor intensive. Ploughing, seeding, and harvesting were all done by hand. As the country's population grew, it was clear that new technology was needed to increase production. Farmers began to carve flat areas for planting out of steep hillsides, called terracing, which grew to be an identifying feature of Chinese agriculture. Multi-tube iron seed drills were invented to evenly distribute seeds, iron sickles and spades made it easier to harvest rice and millet, and animal power started being used in the furrowing process. The development of tools also allowed for large-scale water infrastructure projects, such as water channels for dry farmland irrigation in northern China. Later on, steel tools, such as rakes and shovels, were developed specifically for paddy field growing (rice is grown in flooded fields called paddies). 

 

Today, China's agriculture industry in increasingly industrialized along with global agriculture standard. China produces about 20% of the world's food using only half of its arable land. However,  China's population is over 1.41 billion people, which is a very large number of people to feed. In 2018, China consumed 420 million tonnes of grain, roughly three hundred kilograms per person. To grow this much grain requires approximately 6.9 million hectares of arable land. China has 20% of the world’s arable land, approximately 119 million hectares, and they are always working on increasing their yields. (See Shandong Greenhouses) China had also had to increase its agricultural imports. Since joining the World Trade Organization in 2001, they have become the fourth largest importer of agricultural products in the world, accounting for 60% of global soybean imports and 40% of global cotton imports.