Driverless harvesters, drone patrols, and data flickering on LED screens. This harvest season, Chinese farms impressed international journalists with their technological sophistication.
From Sept. 27 to 30, nearly 30 journalists from countries including the United States, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Cuba, and Singapore traveled to Heilongjiang, a northeastern province known as China's "grain barn."
In the cities of Harbin and Jiamusi, they visited agricultural machinery manufacturing companies, a smart agriculture demonstration zone, and walked into the fields to see how technology is revitalizing China's countryside.
Known for its vast expanses of fertile black soil, Heilongjiang is a major commercial grain base in China and stands as a microcosm of the country's modern large-scale agricultural development.
At Jiamusi Jichi Tractor Manufacturing Co., Ltd., the journalists examined a diesel-electric hybrid tractor and climbed into the cab to try its BeiDou satellite navigation and assisted driving system.
At Heilongjiang Huida Technology Co., Ltd., the journalists learned with some amazement that locally developed agricultural equipment and solutions, from drones to smart irrigation systems, have been exported to many countries and regions.
At the edge of a 1,000-hectare farm, they watched driverless harvesters operate along precise routes, plant-protection drones cruise overhead, and a digital platform monitor field conditions in real time.
Yew Lun Tian with The Straits Times observed that many aspects of farming can now be monitored and managed via smartphones. Chinese farmers, she said, no longer rely solely on manual labor, but are increasingly leveraging technology to boost productivity.
Yaraslau Danilenka with the national state TV and radio company of Belarus was impressed by the role of AI in agriculture.
Witnessing driverless harvesters in operation convinced him even more that this technology will roll out in more countries in the future, Danilenka said.
Autumn crops, the mainstay of China's annual grain production, are now being harvested. According to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, China is on track for a bumper grain harvest in 2026, thanks to steady progress in agricultural and rural modernization.
Food security has long been a priority for China, which feeds nearly one-fifth of the world's population with less than 9 percent of the world's arable land. Ensuring a stable food supply, however, is becoming more challenging amid geopolitical uncertainties and increasingly frequent extreme weather events.
Despite the headwinds, China's annual grain output has remained above 700 million tonnes in 2024 and 2025. Per capita grain availability has surpassed 500 kg, higher than the global average.
China has issued a plan for agricultural and rural modernization for 2026-2030, targeting a 67-percent contribution of science and technology to agricultural development. It also calls for broader AI applications in agriculture and breakthroughs in developing new quality productive forces in the sector.
