Profile - Southeast China

Background of southeast China region:
The SE Region Office of the China Program was established in March 1998. It is located at the Wuhan Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Science, Wuhan city. The Southeast China region includes the provinces of Anhui, Fujian, Hubei, Hunan, Jiangsu, Jiangxi, Shanghai and Zhejiang . Population in this region is 364 million, 28% of China. Arable land area in this region is 26.8 million ha, occupying 20.6% of the national total. The annual value of crops grown is US$ 60.1 billion, 31% of the national total. For the arable land area, rice paddy covered 42% and upland areas covered 58%. In the total farmland sowing area, 60.8% was grain crops, 14.6% was vegetable, 13.6% was oil crops, 3.1% was cotton, 0.56% was Chinese medicinal herbs and the rest were other cash crops.

Compared with other regions of IPNI China Program, the SE region has:
1) higher crop yield in an intensive farming system, high diversity of crop types (grain crops, oil crops, fiber crops, fruits, vegetables, garden plants, forests, forage crops, medicine crops,etc) and better economic conditions with a more developed industry; for example, the average grain crop yield of this region was 17.6% higher than China’s average and farmers net income was 40.5% higher than China’s average (US$ 528/person) in 2006;
2) limited arable land resources, with annual net losses of 1~2% in recent years. Farmland area in SE China region is 1.1 mu (0.073 ha)/person, much lower than the national average 2.11 mu (0.141 ha)/person.
3) higher fertilization rates with unbalanced ratios, table 1 shows the fertilization rates in different provinces in this region in 2006.

Fertilizer	Hubei	Hunan	Shanghai	Jiangsu	Zhejiang	Anhui	Fujian	Jiangxi	Average
N	183.39	133.70	303.79	270.21	169.33	166.37	224.57	105.83	179.62
P2O5	99.20	42.14	44.41	97.09	43.16	77.39	89.08	48.25	72.05
K2O	40.37	49.49	22.48	50.73	25.21	54.18	112.75	44.68	50.05

4) the environmental issues are becoming more and more serious a problem in this region.

Nitrogen fertilization rate in this region is higher than the average rate of China. Especially in the provinces of Shanghai, Jiangsu, Fujian and Hunan, and for the crops such as cotton, and rice, and vegetables. In recent years, reducing N application rates have been recommended in this region for increasing fertilization efficiency and decreasing environmental risk. Average soil Olsen P levels in the region is about 15-25 mg/kg now, higher than 20 years ago. Some fields, such as some vegetable fields near big cities, the soil Olsen P reached over 100 mg/kg and some paddy soil in Jiangsu it is as high as 40-50 mg/kg. On the another hand, many places reported soil P deficiency, such as in Hubei where about 20% citrus growers didn't apply P fertilizer and 42% of citrus gardens are P deficient. Hunan's study showed that high quality rice demands P2O5 at 75-90 kg/ha for high yield. We also found that in spring the temperature is low, more P fertilizer is in demand and the crops in upland get better response to P fertilizer. In some high soil P content fields, no P application doesn't reduce the crops yields but P fertilizer should be used the next season to maintain target yields. It is estimated that about 70-80% of fields in the center and southeastern China should apply P fertilizer every season for high yield and quality. In this region, about 80% of farmland soil showed a K deficiency especially on rice soil. Therefore, a large amount of K fertilizer will still be needed in the region. Table 2 showed the recommendation rates for some major crops in Hubei province as an example.

Crops	N	P2O5	K2O	Average yields
Early rice	150	90	120	5,607
Mid rice	180	90	150	8,222
Late rice	160	90	150	5,823
Wheat	180	120	160	3,060
Maize	150	100	150	4,720
Potato	180	90	180	2,950
Soybean	180	60	150	2,244
Rapeseed	180	90	150	1,915
Peanut	150	60	90	3,458
Sesame	120	80	90	1,390
Cotton	225	120	180	1,111
Vegetable	180	90	150	28,932
Melon	150	80	90	34,527

IPNI SE China Program
IPNI Southeast China Regional Office was established in 1998 and located in Wuhan, the capital city of Hubei province. To accomplish IPNI’s mission, a series of plans and activities were implemented in this region by IPNI SE China region program. Up to 2008, the activities mainly include:
1) total 151 scientific research and demonstration projects created with universities, research institutes, etc between 1986-2008. Through the IPNI projects, the cooperators obtained 126 research projects from central and provincial governments with RMB 68 millions (USD 10 millions). There were 3,070 field trials, 3,280 filed demonstration plots and 403 pot experiments implemented in this period.
2) technology extension through field activities, media, training, workshop and website, …; there were 682 field demonstration activities for leaders and farmers, 85 harvest field days, 373 training courses for farmers, and 97 graduate students (Ph.D & M.S) were trained.
3) provide reports, information and consultation to policy makers, farmers, fertilizer producers, MCs. There were 15 scientific books, 555,304 booklets, 662 scientific and technical papers, 906,900 technical materials published and send to farmers. There were 145 TV programs and 88 Radio programs, 8 provincial websites were created in different provinces. IPNI project cooperators organized and/or attended 38 international symposium / workshops, 128 national symposium / workshops in this period.
4) achievements obtained in the SE region include 46 scientific awards from central and provincial governments, 4 patents of China.

During 1982- 1998, SE China Program mainly work on BF & MYR/MEY and focused on P & K and the major crops such as rice, wheat, rapeseed and cotton. During 1999- 2004, mainly worked on SSNM with 12 monitored villages and over 40 crops, these include: poplar, citrus, tobacco, fish grasses, vegetable in Hubei; peanut, mungbean, Chinese medicine herbs, ginger, Chinese onion, Garlic in Anhui; bamboo, orange, oil-tea, arrow root in Jiangxi; watermelon, lawn-grass, vegetable in Shanghai; mint, gingko in Jiangsu; waxberry, water-bamboo, taro in Zhejiang and pomelo, banana in Fujian provinces. After 2004, research and demonstration activities related to all the nutrients and environment issues, they mainly included SSNM, FUE, AE, Soil and water erosion, area source pollution, food security and safety, GHG,….
All of these activities impacted a number of people, they participated and received understanding about balance fertilization. IPNI leadership in soil fertility and nutrient management has been established in this region. Table 3 shows the fertilizer consumption changes in the region. The ratio of NPK fertilization becomes more and more rational in recent years.

Fertilizer \ year	1996	1998	2000	2002	2006
N	8.94	9.08	8.49	7.03	7.06
P2O5	2.99	3.17	3.05	2.26	2.29
K2O	1.50	1.70	1.79	1.47	1.64
Compound fertilizer	1.83	2.07	2.31	3.14	3.84

Future Opportunities for NM in SE China
1) Integrated use/management of plant nutrient resources, that include: commercial fertilizers, organic fertilizers, green manures, city wastes and so on in the intensive farming systems. These farming systems will move stepwise toward large size farms and mechanized operations. Our plant nutrition management strategy in this region could be adjusted to match with the changes by integrate use/management of all the plant nutrient resources.
2) Some reliable, faster and economic soil and plant testing/diagnosis measures and technologies could be further researched and developed for promote the implement of BMPs for various crops.
3) New types of commercial fertilizers such as control release N fertilizers (CRNFs), bulk brand fertilizers (BBFs) could be created and used for the main crops in this region, especially in the provinces with better economic condition and worse ecological environment condition, such as Jiangsu, Shanghai and Zhejiang provinces.
4) Technologies of precision farming and soilless planting in this region are also developed quickly in recent years. Therefore, precision fertilizing recommendation in various scales, fertigation technology, establishment of regional nutrient management information system/platform, … could greatly improve the management in the farming production.