Latest rapeseed candidate may boost nation's oil crops

Rapeseed crops usually require a longer growth period to become fully laden with oil. However, a new variety tested in Jiangxi province has shown that the oil crop can be grown faster and even produce higher yields.

On Monday, the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, developer of the new variety, said in a media release that its rapeseed output topped 2.63 metric tons per hectare, 26.5 percent higher than mainstream varieties planted in the province.

In addition, the growth cycle, lasting about 169 days in the province, was about five days shorter.

The growing period for rapeseed decreases the further south it's planted. For example, the variety can be ready in just 156 days in lab settings in the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region, which borders Vietnam.

The results have set a record for such crops, which farmers rotate with rice and other crop species to reduce the country's reliance on imported oil crops, the academy said.

"The course of rapeseed breeding in China has witnessed a major breakthrough," it said.

China has around 4.26 million hectares of farmland left vacant during colder months in the Yangtze River Basin, which can be used to grow oil crops, according to the CAAS.

However, the lack of an oil-rich variety, which also has a growth cycle short enough to be planted between two seasons of food crops, has long been a "short plank" in attempts to make full use of such idle farmland.

A team of scientists from the CAAS led by academician Wang Hanzhong conducted research on the new variety for six years.

Apart from having a shorter growth cycle, it is resistant to cold, disease and stem buckling, and fit to be harvested by machinery.

The CAAS said that efforts to breed and promote high-yield and time-saving oil crops mean a lot for securing China's cooking oil supply and aiding the national rural vitalization strategy.

It is estimated that the new variety, if planted nationwide in winter, could raise the annual output of rapeseed by 11.2 million tons, and rapeseed oil by 4.96 million tons. That would raise China's self-sufficiency rate for cooking oil by 12 percentage points.