China’s species resources: a disappearing treasure trove of inscriptions
January 23, 2008, Geneva, Switzerland.
United Nations Headquarters Conference Center.
A conference on "Access to Genetic Resources and Benefit Sharing" is being held here. An international negotiation on biological species sovereignty is intensely underway. “For many years, China has been a provider of genetic resources, and it agrees with the position of Brazil, Colombia, India, Malaysia and other countries. China advocates the use of mandatory and binding international treaties to combat the plunder and misappropriation of genetic species resources by developed countries. ” Xue Dayuan, a professor at Minzu University of China who represented China at the “Genetic Resources Access and Benefit Sharing” conference, argued for China’s species sovereignty to the representatives of developed countries attending the meeting.
The so-called species sovereignty refers to the country’s sovereignty over the biological species resources distributed within its territory. Developed countries have been exploiting and utilizing the genetic resources of developing countries and obtaining huge profits from the genetic resources of developing countries through intellectual property protection.
China still lacks the corresponding awareness of protection when it comes to this type of strategic resources. In fact, many Chinese biological species have already been deliberately plundered and stolen by some developed countries due to people's indifference to species resources. At the same time, environmental pollution and crazy mining or hunting have also caused a significant decline in species.
Lessons from Cherry Duck
Currently, the Chinese market accounts for 70% of the ducks consumed in the world every year. This is really a huge and attractive market.
Behind this, the British Cherry Valley Farm transports about 900 million cherries to the Chinese market and the international market every year through Chinese breeding companies such as Henan Huaying Group, Shandong Legang Group, and Liuhe Group. Grain duck. Industry insiders have calculated that China’s annual import of Cherry Valley breeding ducks from the UK is about 200 million yuan.
In contrast, Beijing Jinxing Duck Industry Group, which specializes in the production of local Peking ducks, has an annual sales volume of only 450,000 breeding ducks and only more than 6.2 million commercial ducks. Compared with the Huaying Group's production of Cherry Valley duck, which is worth over 100 million, it can be said to be insignificant.
What is even more surprising is that, according to experts, the ancestors of these British "Cherry Valley ducks" are China's "Peking ducks". But now, British ducks are aggressively occupying China's poultry and duck market with their low prices and advantages that are more in line with modern people's tastes.
For the vast majority of Chinese people, the British "Cherry Valley" farm is an extremely unfamiliar institution. This farm, established in 1958, is located in the quiet town of Rothwell in the northeastern suburbs of Lincolnshire, England. It is named after the rows of cherry trees surrounding it.
According to information on its website, in the late 1950s, a farmer named "J. Nickerson" began to organize a team to study duck breeding issues. Market research they conducted found that many British people liked to eat roast duck made from Peking duck, but they felt that the roast duck variety at that time was too fatty. If the lean meat rate of duck can be improved, there will definitely be a huge market. So a team of multidisciplinary talents began to gather in "Cherry Valley" to study the breeding of Peking ducks.
Through years of genetic selection experiments, the British have bred fast-growing, lean ducks, and soon became the leader in British duck exports. In 1984 and 1994, the Queen of England awarded the "Cherry Valley" farm the "Queen's Medal" twice in recognition of its contribution to the British export trade. Today, more than 2.5 billion "Cherry Valley ducks" are consumed around the world every year.
Perhaps, what people have not noticed is that what is roasted in many "Peking ducks" nowadays is not the traditional "Peking duck" that people are familiar with, but replaced by a duck species from the UK - "Cherry Valley duck" . Even the well-known Chinese time-honored brand "Quanjude" is no exception.
It is understood that many nationally well-known meat product processing brands such as Henan "Shuanghui" and Nanjing "Yurun" are also using Cherry Valley duck to produce "salted duck", "Zhangcha duck" and "sauce duck" ".
In supermarkets in most cities in China, the increasingly popular "cut duck deli products" (foods made by dividing duck necks, duck feet, duck wings, etc.) also use Cherry Valley duck as raw materials.
The British Cherry Valley duck has become a mainstream breed in the Chinese market. Not only the Peking duck has been left out, but the shelducks from Jiangsu, Gaoyou ducks, Muscovy ducks from Fujian, Sichuan and other places are all shrinking under the impact of the Cherry Valley duck market.
The shrinkage and disappearance of species in China
“China now has more than 700 livestock and poultry breeds, more than 200 of which are imported from abroad, and more than 400 of which are China’s own. However, The breeds are relatively old. Most of the real livestock production now is imported breeds, such as Dutch cows, and our survey shows that old local breeds such as Ningxia Tan sheep and Guandong donkeys are not the main production breeds. And the number is very small and shrinking. Only 10 old varieties continue to be produced, and about 90 varieties are gradually dying out," said Xue Dayuan, a professor at the School of Life and Environmental Sciences of Minzu University of China.
Some of China’s famous improved breeds of cattle, pigs, and chickens are becoming increasingly mixed and extinct, and the situation is critical. Among them, the loss of pig breed resources is the most serious, followed by chicken breeds. my country's famous "Nine Jin Yellow Chicken" and "Langshan Chicken" can now only be found in breeding bases in Russia and the United States.
With the continuous expansion of these exotic livestock and poultry species, China's native species resources are facing the danger of rapid shrinkage. So what's the reason?
First, for a long time, the practice of "emphasis on introduction and neglect of cultivation" has caused introduced varieties to continuously replace the country's excellent local varieties, and the development of my country's animal husbandry industry has become increasingly dependent on foreign countries.
Take the duck farm where Hou Shuisheng, a researcher at the Beijing Institute of Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Medicine of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, works as an example. There are currently only about 4,000 ducks in 9 strains, each representing different production performance. However, due to limited scientific research funds and lack of market channels and other supports, the improved Peking duck project he studied can only be maintained by the income from providing technical guidance and services to external parties.
It is understood that some domestic companies would rather introduce excellent foreign duck breeds at a price of tens of yuan per duck than cultivate China's own local ducks.
The second is that species cultivation cannot keep pace with the times according to market conditions, leading to self-shrinking.
For example, the saltwater duck consumed in Nanjing used to be local shelduck, with tens of millions of ducks consumed a year, but now more than 80% use Cherry Valley duck. Because Cherry Valley ducks have a short growth period and are cheap, they can be sent for slaughter in 30 days, while local shelducks need to wait 70 days. The Nanjing Osmanthus Duck Group, a century-old brand synonymous with Nanjing's "salted duck" and with annual sales of more than 10 million ducks, can only use British "Cherry Valley duck" as its duck meat raw material.
For another example, since the invention of cramming duck breeding in the Qing Dynasty of China, the above operation has been almost the only way to raise Peking ducks. With the development of China's economy, Chinese people's food habits are also changing, and now the demand for ducks that are neither fat nor greasy in taste is gradually increasing. In fact, Chinese consumers generally complain that roast duck is too fat because it is stuffed duck.
Interestingly, as early as 50 years ago, the British also pointed out that Peking duck was too fat, so they also improved a lean duck - today's "Cherry Valley duck".
Subsequently, "Cherry Valley Duck" traveled around the world, and the market responded enthusiastically. However, the Peking Duck, its ancestor, is still limited to the limited market of Peking Roast Duck and has missed out on market opportunities.
Now, in the words of industry insiders, China’s species crisis is: the loss and loss of biological species, and among these two problems, the loss of species is particularly serious. Since the founding of the People's Republic of China, biological species resources have been rapidly reduced due to man-made reasons and environmental destruction.
For example, the severe damage to the natural environment has caused more than 300 species of terrestrial vertebrates to be on the verge of extinction, and many other animal and plant species, such as snow lotus and cordyceps in traditional Chinese medicine, are also on the verge of extinction.
Vigorously protect Chinese species
China is in a period of rapid economic development, and the contradiction between environmental protection and economic development is becoming increasingly acute. Biodiversity plays an important role in ecosystem diversity, species diversity and genetics. Diversity is seriously threatened at all three levels.
The "Red List of Chinese Species" published in 2004 conducted a new assessment of the extinction risk of 10,211 species of animals and plants in China (including 5,803 species of animals and 4,408 species of plants). The assessment shows that the endangered species situation in China is much higher than the proportion estimated in the past. The proportion of threatened species of various biological species is generally between 20 and 40. In particular, the proportion of threatened species of plants far exceeds past estimates, such as wild soybeans, Wild rice etc.
It is understood that more than 90% of the world’s known wild soybean resources are distributed in my country. However, because many special traits of wild soybeans are of great significance for improving soybean quality, they have become a source of patent competition between breeding and bioengineering companies. right goal.
It is understood that as early as 1907, a New Zealand female principal named Isabel went to Yichang, Hubei Province to visit her sister and brought Chinese kiwi seeds back to New Zealand. After that, local horticulture expert Alexander cultivated the first New Zealand kiwi fruit - kiwi fruit. Kiwifruit has now become New Zealand's third largest export commodity, accounting for 1/3 of the world's total production.
It is reported that in order to maintain and improve the quality of kiwi fruit, New Zealand is still continuously collecting wild kiwi fruit resources in China. In contrast, in China, in order to seize the market, in the past few years, due to the one-sided pursuit of yield, artificially cultivated high-yielding kiwifruit varieties have gradually replaced the original plant varieties. Wild Chinese kiwifruit and Dabie Mountain kiwifruit have become extremely rare, and some varieties Even on the verge of extinction.
According to experts, the reason why the protection of genetic species resources has aroused the alarm of high-level officials in the Chinese government is precisely because the Chinese embassy staff in Australia and New Zealand learned that these countries collect and attach great importance to China's genetic species resources. .
In fact, China’s “Wild Plant Protection Regulations” stipulate that foreign collection of China’s species resources must obtain the consent of relevant state departments. However, according to relevant sources from the State Environmental Protection Administration, “in recent years, the Ministry of Agriculture has basically No relevant applications have been received.”
In recent years, the shrinking and loss of genetic species resources has attracted the attention of the government. Since 2004, the State Environmental Protection Administration has joined forces with the Ministry of Agriculture and other departments to investigate China's species resources. Now the species cataloging work in various fields has been completed. In November 2007, the "National Biological Species Resources Conservation and Utilization Plan Outline" was approved by the State Council. The outline proposes that by 2010, the current trend of rapid decline in biological species resources will be basically contained.
Not long ago, the State Environmental Protection Administration also issued a "National Biological Species Resource Utilization and Protection Development Plan", which is finally a move to remedy the situation.
In fact, as early as 2004, the General Office of the State Council emphasized in the "Notice on Strengthening the Protection and Management of Biological Species Resources" that it is necessary to step up legislation on the protection and management of biological species resources and establish relevant laws and regulations on genetic resources. System for access to traditional knowledge and benefit sharing.
As for the legislation on genetic resources management, we must first define biological genetic resources, that is, what biological genetic resources are. Then there is the ownership of biological genetic resources. Biological genetic resources belong to the state, unless otherwise provided by law.
In addition, a payment system needs to be established. If foreign biological genetic resource development and utilization units use Chinese biological genetic resources to obtain products developed through illegal means and sell them in China, they must also pay biological genetic resources fees to the agency designated by the State Council.