"China needs foreign help to feed itself at grain production when it comes to fertilizer supply, especially potash and phosphorus fertilizers.” Said CHEN Fang, researcher at Wuhan Botanical Garden (WBG), Chinese Academy of Sciences in an article published in Nature recently.

CHEN's article is a correspondence to the view point of GONG Peng, Prof. at Tsinghua University, on food security issues in China that previously published in Nature. GONG held the view that Lester Brown's worry about the Chinese food security in his article “Can the United States feed China?” was unnecessary. It is not a matter of whether China can feed itself but whether the Chinese people will choose to do so.

"On the one hand, we should rely on our own efforts; on the other hand, we need to pay more attention to international cooperation and exchange," said CHEN in an interview with Science Times reporter.

"Grain production is of vital significance and needs overall consideration" CHEN addressed. “Although China has, with just 9% of the globe's arable land, fed about 21% of the world's population, it alsoconsumed one third of world’s commercial fertilizer which is important to the grain production.”

CHEN mentioned that “Fertilizer is the ‘food’ of grain. China has been self-sufficient in nitrogen and phosphorus fertilizers since 1997 and 2006, respectively, but still imports about half of its potassium fertilizer. Fertilizer consumption is set to rise by 2–3% annually as its population increases to almost 1.5 billion in 2030.”

High fertilizer consumption will bring a new round of energy and mineral resources crisis. CHEN said that "Without importing commercial fertilizers, energy and technology to produce grain more efficiently, China will be unable to meet its future grain needs. We should strengthen the basic research onscientific use the existing fertilizer resources and greatly improve fertilization efficiency to ensure the grain production and sustainable development of agriculture.”

CHEN Fang: Researcher at Wuhan Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, doctoral tutor, executive member of Soil Science Society of China, executive member of Chinese Society of Plant Nutrition and Fertilizer.  

Research field: plant nutrition, soil improvement and fertilization, agricultural ecology. 

Relative research projects being undertaken in recent years:

Research and demonstration on efficient water and fertilizer managements for rice in Yangtze River valley, 2006-2010. 

Research on the physiological and biochemical mechanism of high efficient uptake and use of fertilizer and rhizosphere soil potassium, 2007-2009.

Research and demonstration on the agro-ecological restoration technology in Danjiangkou Reservoir region for the South-to-North Water Transfer Project, 2008-2010.