A delegation from Yinong Corporation, the leading farming enterprise in Harbin, Heilongjiang province, has visited EkoNiva’s Kursk subdivision in Shchigry district. The main purpose of the business meeting was to exchange experience.

The guests from the Celestial Empire were presented to the Group's areas of activity, work of EkoNiva-Semena’s plant breeding centre, seed production enterprises of EkoNiva-Kursk and were shown demonstration plots of soya beans.

Founded 15 years ago, Yinong is an integrated company engaged in plant breeding, seed growing and introducing high-quality seeds into production. The Chinese specialists came to the holding to share experience and discuss partnership opportunities.

‘We have seen for ourselves that EkoNiva pays great attention to science. What has impressed us most is the warm welcome and the scale of the company’s business. It has been a success in different segments – plant breeding, seed growing and dairy farming – and has a great future’, says Mei Mei, Vice President of Yinong Corporation.

For both Russia and China, farming is one of the key sectors of the economy. The Celestial Empire is the global leader in agricultural production. Russia is among the top three countries in the world in terms of cropland area. Therefore, mutual cooperation in this field is particularly promising now. The Heilongjiang Academy of Agricultural Sciences had established the Chinese-Russian centre for research and technical cooperation in farming. Its director Zhang Jiumei, as part of the delegation from Harbin, also visited EkoNiva's Kursk subdivision.

‘The major goal is to come into contact with Russian enterprises for further research work. Scientists from our countries have been collaborating for a long time, and now, it would be great to establish business interaction in production. I believe that the partnership between Russia and China in the farming sector will only grow stronger’, emphasises Zhang Jiumei.

‘We have a lot in common with Yinong. United by the same area of activity – plant breeding and seed growing – our companies can benefit enormously from experience exchange and cross-training of young specialists. We are also interested in the work within a maize breeding and seed production programme’, shares Vitaliy Voloshchenko, Director of EkoNiva’s Plant Breeding and Seed Maintenance Centre.