Main technology in China's northwest rain-fed agricultural production: Furrow ridge mulching technology

摘要

During the last two thousand years of history, people have been exploring technologies on how to make maximum use of natural rainfall and improve rainwater utilization, without considering improvements in quality of the technologies.With global warming, rapid rise in world population and food insecurity increasing, it is particularly critical to develop new types of farming techniques on water conservation, reduced water runoff, reduced evapotranspiration and increased rainwater catchment.Furrow mulching techniques are currently the most important appropriate farming technologies.With the boom of the plastic industry, furrow mulching technology began to be developed in the mid-20th century.Recently, plastic film mulching cultivation techniques have been introduced and used widely in some developed countries in the world.China introduced mulching cultivation techniques in 1978, and in just over a few years, the national plastic film mulch cultivation area has expanded rapidly.Statistical estimates indicate that in China, plastic film mulching has been applied to on an area of approximating 6.667 million ha2, becoming the world's leader country in plastic mulching cultivation area.In China, more than 60 different types of crops are grown under plastic film mulch cultivation.This has been a breakthrough innovation in cultivation technology.