Technology Empowers Spring Ploughing in Ji’an, Laying Foundation for Grain Harvest

JI’AN, Jiangxi, April 10, 2026 – At the Rice Smart Farm Base of Jinggangshan Agricultural High-tech Zone in Jizhou District, Ji’an City, Jiangxi Province, 58-year-old Liu Wen’an is busy adjusting unmanned rotary tillers and unmanned seeding machines in the workshop. “I used to worry that I would be too old to work, but now with these devices, farming has become easier and easier!” he said with a smile. As spring ploughing and seedling raising get in full swing across all counties and districts of Ji’an, the city is embracing a busy and hopeful farming season, according to China News Service.

“We focus on the goal of ‘stabilizing planting area, increasing per unit yield and boosting benefits’, and have built a full-chain service system covering task implementation, agricultural material supply, agricultural machinery support, law enforcement supervision and policy support to lay a solid foundation for a bumper grain harvest throughout the year,” said He Qiang, section chief of Grain and Oil Department of Ji’an Municipal Bureau of Agriculture and Rural Affairs.

Technological empowerment is accelerating in Ji’an’s spring ploughing. At the Seedling Raising Center of Lianjia Village Group, Hutian Village Committee in Xingqiao Town, a once idle industrial base has been turned into a fertile land for seedling cultivation. Inside 34 constant-temperature seedling greenhouses, green shoots thrive, and assembly lines run smoothly. Layer by layer of substrate, grain seeds and substrate again – soaked grains are neatly arranged in seedling trays by a “tray stacking machine”. “Only 3 villagers are needed for one assembly line, which can complete nearly 10,000 seedling trays a day. Farmers can get high-quality seedlings on time and on demand by entrusting their seeds to us,” said Zhou Zhiwen, person in charge of the seedling raising base.

To solve the problem of “having land but no time to farm or fearing poor planting”, Xinxing Grain Industrialization Professional Cooperative in Futian Town, Qingyuan District, has innovatively launched four farmer-linking models: land transfer, minimum guarantee dividend, farm management entrustment and order-based planting. It provides one-stop trusteeship services including ploughing, sowing, management, harvesting and sales, allowing farmers to “work outside without abandoning their fields and increase income steadily by farming at home”.

Before going out to work in March this year, Wang Maochun, a villager from Shuikou Village in Futian Town, entrusted his 4 mu of land to the cooperative. More than 60 farmers in Futian Town have done the same. “This year, the cooperative has undertaken trusteeship services for more than 3,000 mu of farmland, covering 4 surrounding administrative villages, ensuring a stable grain yield of over 550 kilograms per mu and driving more farmers to grow good grain and increase production,” said Luo Zhaoming, person in charge of the cooperative.

Diligent farmers bring good harvests, and agricultural machinery ensures high yields. At the agricultural machinery scrap outlet of Wenfeng Agricultural Machinery Maintenance Center in Jishui County, Xi Fenggen, a rice grower from Laoqiao Town, is busy handling scrap procedures for his old agricultural machinery. “I scrapped two transplanters and one harvester this year and plan to buy a new rotary tiller. I got more than 10,000 yuan in scrap subsidies and over 10,000 yuan in discounts for the new machine, saving a total of more than 20,000 yuan,” he said. To support “storing grain in technology”, Jishui County has optimized the agricultural machinery scrap and renewal subsidy policy, adopting a “one-stop + online handling” model to reduce farmers’ trips and deliver financial support directly to the frontline of spring ploughing.

This year, Ji’an’s intended early rice planting area has reached more than 3.793 million mu. At present, the city has reserved 12,100 tons of early rice seeds and is expected to put 142,000 sets of agricultural machinery into use. Data from the China Economic Database shows that Ji’an’s grain output reached 3.795 million tons in 2025, and this year’s spring ploughing efforts are laying a solid foundation for the annual grain production target of 3.7115 million tons. In the fields of Ji’an, every busy figure and every piece of advanced machinery is weaving a beautiful picture of a bumper harvest.