Growing Food Security

A Chinese expert helps increase rice production in Mozambique

- Li Jing

December is the hottest time of the year in Mozambique. Under a hot sun on December 25, 2019, more than 30 technicians and trainees were learning rice transplanting techniques in a test field of the Mozambique Agricultural Research Institute. Most of them had never planted rice before. Their faces were radiant with excitement. Surrounded by the trainees, He Changyong, a Chinese crop expert, was there to guide them and give them technical advice.

Despite the scorching 35-degree Celsius heat, He worked for more than five hours in the field. At the end of the two days of training, his face, neck and legs were burned by the sun. “I am heartily happy to see that they are really learning how to grow rice. It’s all worth it,” he said. According to He, he and his students were able to start the transplanting work in some 6.67 hectares of the trial field.

With nearly 30 years of experience in crop cultivation, He is the head of the third Chinese expert group under a SinoMozambican agricultural cooperation project.

“I was born in the countryside and spent my childhood in the fields. I have been dedicated to agriculture from a young age. My dream is that people around the world do not have to worry about putting food on their table,” said He. In 1987, he entered China Agricultural University to pursue his dream. With the development of agriculture in China, the challenge of food security was gradually resolved in the country. However, thinking that many people on the African continent were still facing a food crisis, He decided to dedicate himself to the cause of China-Africa agricultural cooperation.