Food security: A collaboration worth its weight in grain.

Abstract

Interventions to improve crop yields in rural China through collaboration between researchers and farmers illustrate how the goal of increasing global food production can be approached locally. See Letter p.671 Closing the gap between realized and potential crop yields is key to sustainably feeding the world's growing population. Fusuo Zhang and colleagues report on attempts to increase wheat and maize yields of smallholder farms in four villages in Quzhou County in the North China Plain, using ten practices recommended by the Science and Technology Backyard, a co-operative research project involving agricultural scientists, local extension officers and smallholder farmers. Adoption of these practices—including alternative seed varieties, sowing times and other crop management practices—raised five-year-average yields from 68% to 97% of the attainable level on target farms, and 63% to 80% countywide. The authors suggest that this approach could be adopted in other parts of the world to help smallholder farmers achieve greater yields.