Ambassador works on US farm for a day

Huge potential

China has worked keenly on agricultural green development in recent years, he said, and the country has adopted laws and regulations on black soil protection, realized zero increase in the use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides and promoted the application of information technology and digital farming.

China's policies, technologies and expertise in sustainable development of agriculture are steadily improving, he said.

Several leading global companies in seed and crop protection whose research and development bases are in the US are contributing products and farming solutions to China's green development, Qin said.

After the meeting Qin visited Warren Stemme Farm in a western suburb of St Louis, where he heard about how the farm uses environmentally friendly processes to reduce carbon emissions.

"Ambassador Qin, I invite you to harvest corn with me," Warren Stemme, the farm owner, said.

"OK, let's go," Qin said.

Qin and Stemme then drove a combine harvester together toward a cornfield. As the corn stalks fell one by one, the air was filled with the smell of corn.

Stemme then invited Qin to a soybean field, where Stemme picked two bunches of soy beans and asked Qin to taste them.

"From Iowa to Missouri, it feels great to be back in the Midwest and be a farmer for another day. It's not just corn and soybeans that are harvested here," Qin said.

On Friday Qin also visited the Chinese Garden of the Missouri Botanical Garden in St Louis, designed and built by the city of Nanjing in 1994 to commemorate the 15th anniversary of its relationship with St Louis.

On Thursday Qin attended a baseball game in which the St Louis Cardinals played. He pitched the first ball of the game to commemorate the 43rd anniversary of the first China-US sister city relationship, between Nanjing and St Louis.