“Belt and Road Initiative” the 2nd International Plant Breeding Course was launched on September 16 at the College of Pastoral Agriculture Science and Technology, Lanzhou University (LZU). The 14-day course was co-organized by the College of Pastoral Agriculture Science and Technology, the State Key Laboratory of Herbage Improvement and Grassland Agro-ecosystems, and the International Joint Research Center of Pastoral Agricultural Ecology. More than 130 experts and trainee representatives from 19 countries participated in the course.
The opening ceremony was held on the morning of September 17. Professor Wang Wei, Vice-President of LZU, extended a warm welcome to all participants from home and abroad. He expressed his hope that the course would fully leverage LZU’s strength in plant breeding and pastoral agriculture, and emphasized that this would not only promote the sharing of agricultural technologies but also enhance international agricultural technology standards and talent cultivation capability, thereby making a greater contribution to regional agricultural cooperation and mutual benefit.
Professor German Spangenberg from La Trobe University, a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering and Deputy Editor of Grassland Research, delivered a speech on behalf of the instructors. Drawing on global trends in plant breeding, he highlighted the significant climate diversity and varied agricultural demands across countries along the Belt and Road. He emphasized that transnational and interdisciplinary technical collaboration is key to addressing crop adaptability challenges and expressed his hope that this course would become an international platform for technology exchange, fostering the breeding of superior crop varieties better adapted to regional environments. On behalf of the trainees, Jazib Javed from Pakistan expressed sincere gratitude to the course organizers and professors. He affirmed the integrating Chinese traditional agriculture with cutting-edge science and the policy of open cooperation, and called for leveraging this course as a bridge to jointly advance future agricultural collaboration.
Professor German Spangenberg and Dr. Chris Jones, Director of Forage Improvement Group at the International Livestock Research Institute, successively delivered keynote lectures titled “Applied Systems Biology and Predictive Breeding in Pasture and Crops” and “The Role of CGIAR in Plant Breeding in Developing Countries”.
The 1st International Plant Breeding Course was held at LZU in September 2019. The second course will further expand the influence and recognition of China’s agricultural science and technology in Africa and regions along the Belt and Road, establish a cross-border cooperation platform in plant breeding among China, Africa, as well as countries along the Belt and Road, thereby contributing to global food security.
