Growing skills and crops

Residents of Nanmeng village hailed the completion of a training center as a success in the "Monsanto Green Village" charity program.

The agricultural and technology training center in Nanmeng of Hebei province is the first "Green Village" in a joint program organized by Monsanto, the US agriculture products company, and China Women's Development Foundation.

The program aims to improve overall living conditions of local people by enhancing farming skills, developing local educational conditions and renovating infrastructure.

The two-year philanthropic program began last year with an investment of $200,000. Together with Hebei Agricultural University, the first year of the program trained both young and middle-aged farmers in high-quality food production and ecological pig breeding.

Lectures on breeding skills and growing techniques in specialty agriculture, as well as explanations of laws, regulations and ethical issues, are part of the program.

Field training was also given to local farmers to enlarge their knowledge on wheat growing, preserving corn seed and field fertilization.

Also included was building of the farmers training center with a library, a reading room and two recreation rooms, which will be used by local farmers to exchange ideas and experience, to hold lectures and festivals and to enrich local cultural life.

A second phase of the program includes construction of a methane pool for ecological breeding of pigs. Work has begun on the pool and nearby pigsties and is scheduled to be completed before the end of the year.

"When finished, it will produce 500 cu m every day and provide methane for 300 households," Feng Zhihua, Party secretary of Nanmeng village, told China Business Weekly.

(China Daily 06/29/2009 page10)