Focus on pepper: Revitalize the "ace industry"
December 12, 2023
Pepper is the most widely used spice crop in the world, known as the "king of spices", widely used in the food industry, with great potential for development. In China, the planting area of pepper has more than 370,000 mu, the annual output of more than 40,000 tons, ranking fifth in the world. As a pepper supply area of Liuhang agriculture, Hainan's pepper area and output account for more than 86% of the country, which has played an important role in poverty alleviation and rural revitalization. Pepper was once known as the "ace industry" in Hainan, but in recent years, affected by the international supply and demand relationship, the price continues to decrease, the production cost rises, the efficiency further declines, and the industrial development is hindered. It is urgent to make efforts of the whole industrial chain to accelerate the improvement of industrial quality and efficiency.
Mechanized planting is imperative
Yang Jianfeng, director of the Pepper Research Center of the Fragrant Beverage Institute of the Chinese Academy of Thermal Sciences, said that under the condition of not reducing the number of plants per unit area, they have carried out a convenient transformation of the traditional planting mode of equal rows, adopting a wide and narrow row mode, and setting the row spacing according to the minimum size of the mainstream production machinery.
Although there are still many problems with mechanized soil fertilization, Yang Jianfeng believes that it is imperative for the planting end of the pepper industry to replace the machine, and the government needs to increase support, integrate multi-party resources, and develop mechanized planting mode, mechanized deep fertilization technology and supporting machinery and equipment for pepper, so as to change the traditional high-cost and low-efficiency planting methods, and promote mechanized production at the planting end. It is of great practical significance to realize cost saving and high efficiency.
Compound cultivation saves cost and increases efficiency
Pepper is a perennial crop, long-term planting is prone to continuous cropping obstacles, which has become the main problem faced by the main producing countries in the world. China's pepper producing areas are relatively concentrated and intensive, more than 50% of pepper gardens have been continuously planted for more than 20 years, and the problem of continuous cropping obstacles is more prominent. It is urgent to maintain the soil health of pepper gardens and ensure the sustainable use of soil through ecological planting.
For this reason, the Institute of Fragrant Beverage of the Chinese Academy of Thermal Sciences has systematically studied the causes of pepper continuous cropping obstacles for many years, and has jointly studied and explored a variety of ecological planting models such as pepper and areca nut compound planting.
The expectations of the people and the appeals of experts have been highly valued by the Hainan provincial government. The Three-year Action Plan for the Cultivation and Development of the Whole industrial Chain of Hainan Province with Tropical Characteristics and High Efficiency Agriculture (2022-2024) lists pepper as one of the 11 key potential industries supported by the province to accelerate the cultivation of the whole industrial chain of agriculture.
Next, Hainan will continue to strengthen the public brand of Hainan pepper, build a comprehensive industrial brand system based on public brands and effectively supplemented by local characteristic brands, accelerate the cultivation of "chain master" enterprises in the pepper industry, strengthen the benefit sharing mechanism of the whole industrial chain, and build pepper advantage and characteristic industrial clusters to ensure the stability of the chain and increase efficiency, and help rural revitalization.
