Focus on Arts and Ecology

The big environmental stories in the Chinese media this week (4-10 October)

Between 2015 to 2018 China saw the area used to grow organic vegetables almost triple, according to a recent report by China Agriculture University and the State Administration for Market Regulation. 

The report reveals the most popular organic vegetables planted in China are sweet potatoes (24,200 hectares), followed by melon vegetables (10,900 hectares) and perennial vegetables (8,100 hectares). 

“From 2015 to 2018, the number of organic certifications issued increased rapidly,” said Zhou Juan, an expert at the Organic Food Development and Certification Center of China, as farms around the country entered the organic business. According to Zhou, organic production is concentrated primarily in four provinces, Sichuan and Yunnan in the south-west, Xinjiang in the far west and Hainan in the tropical south.

China has a growing appetite for organic food, as increasingly affluent consumers in the big cities value food quality more than ever. According to a 2017 report from the International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements, China is the world’s fourth-largest consumer of organic foods, with sales of about US$5.6 billion. 

Read our recent piece on how e-commerce is reshaping organic farming in China.