When the late Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin visited China in October, 1993, he proposed to Prime Minister Li Peng to establish a demonstration farm in China where, in cooperation with Chinese professionals and technicians, the latest technological developments in agriculture would be displayed. The farm would be designed to demonstrate how farmers could increase their crops and improve the quality of their produce, while conserving water and making better use of farmland, both in high demand in China. The demonstration farm would also serve as a showcase for the various Israeli agricultural firms desiring to enter into business relations with China.
The task of implementing the farm was given to MASHAV, the Center for International Cooperation of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in conjunction with CINADCO (the Center for International Agricultural Development Cooperation of the Israeli Ministry of Agriculture and agricultural arm of MASHAV) and AGRIDEV (Agricultural Development Company), an Israeli governmental company rich in experience. Operations started in March 1994 with the dispatch of a multi-disciplinary team of experts whose task was to make a comprehensive survey, propose an appropriate site for the project and to evaluate the benefits for a commercially favorable outcome. In June of that same year, a team of Chinese experts was invited to Israel to become acquainted with Israeli technology. Two months later, an irrigation system was installed on the farm, the first seedlings of Israeli-bred vegetables were planted and two Israeli experts, Shmuel From and Erez Cohen, began work. The first phase of the project was underway.
At the end of 1997, a second team of Israeli agricultural experts, Boaz Guy and Yoav Talmi, the author, took over responsibility for the second phase.
The Yongledian demonstration farm was established in the Tongxian Province. In the beginning three greenhouses of an Israeli type with an area of 13 dunams and another three greenhouses of a Chinese type with an area of 1 mu (1 mu = 2/3 dunam = 1/15 hectare) were constructed. The Israeli greenhouses were equipped with advanced technical facilities: plastic cover for the roof and sides, drip irrigation, ventilators, thermal screen, automatic curtains, automatic irrigation and weather control. The Chinese greenhouses, also called sunshine greenhouses, have only drip irrigation and some basic automation for the irrigation. Later at 1996 an additional greenhouse was constructed to serve as a vegetable nursery, with the area of 2 dunams.
An office and storage building with cooling rooms and a demonstration area were built and 200 dunams of orchards planted. These included grapes, peaches, apricots, apples and cherries. Now we have all those and 70 dunams of sunshine greenhouses divided into 7 sectors, as well as buildings for storage and offices, and two large buildings completed in March, 1999, which serve as a study center for Israeli on-the-spot courses.
From the start many visitors have come to see the farm, among them senior officials and politicians, in addition to the general public. Coverage of the farm has appeared on local television as well as in enthusiastic articles in the national and international press. Quite a number of university students and technical personnel have visited or stayed at the farm for some months in order to learn advanced agricultural techniques. This, in fact, was the reason behind a local initiative to set up a study center.
Our team, agronomist Boaz Guy and myself, an agricultural engineer, came here with our families for a two-year stint. We live in adjacent apartments in the San Li Tun neighborhood of Beijing and every morning we drive 50 kilometers southwest of the city to the farm. The driving sometimes is very difficult in snowy or foggy weather.
In two of the Israeli greenhouses and three of the sunshine greenhouses we grow roses. In addition we also grow carnations, sunflowers and renuncoleus in the sunshine greenhouses. In some of the Chinese greenhouses we are cultivating vegetables, mainly tomatoes, cherry tomatoes and peppers. In the third Israeli greenhouse tomatoes and peppers are cultivated using a long-wire method. A fourth greenhouse is the vegetable seedling nursery, which produces the seedlings for our farm and other farms, some of them located at a distance in other provinces. Boaz and I share responsibility for the professional management and successful operation of the farm.
The farm is run as a commercial company whose economic activity and decision-making are managed by Zhu Hongfeng, who has visited Israel several times as MASHAV's guest. There are several deputy managers and young technicians who are graduates of university or agricultural technique schools with whom we have routine meetings every week. In addition we solve immediate problems in real time together. Boaz and I both have computers with Internet connections which we utilize for much of our work. In spite of the difficulties we love our work and have enjoyed our stay in China.