On August 18, as the first light of dawn broke, Li Li, head of the Harbin Juyang Vegetable Planting Cooperative, and her husband were driving toward the 70th anniversary celebration of the Heilongjiang Academy of Agricultural Sciences. A sweet melon aroma filled the car as Li Li tightened the bag of melons behind her—a carefully chosen gift for the academy's milestone birthday. Years ago, her greenhouse fruit and vegetable business was constrained by traditional cultivation methods, with products lacking market competitiveness and income growth hitting a bottleneck. The turning point came eight years ago when she connected with academy expert Qian Hua, whose selenium-enriched agriculture system team imparted the pioneering "crop quality improvement and selenium-enrichment technology" developed over more than a decade of research, launching her entrepreneurial path in premium agriculture.
At the academy's public achievement exhibition held on the 18th, many farmers like Li Li, who have benefited from the academy's technological support, brought their premium products and received unanimous praise from visitors. The decades of scientific research accumulated by the academy have benefited countless households, and years of working side by side in the fields have forged deep bonds between agricultural experts, farmers, and entrepreneurs.
"Relying solely on the enterprise itself, it's difficult to make the industry refined and stable—this is why we proactively connected with the academy's beef cattle experts for cooperation," said Wu Xiaoyun, brand director of Heizunniu Industry Group, with emotion. She noted that the partnership with the academy has provided a technological backbone for the local beef cattle industry, with regular industry-academia-research collaboration solving two major challenges: cow breeding and fattening in cold climates, genuinely driving income growth for local communities.
Chinese Academy of Engineering Academician Tang Huajun joined attendees in tasting the academy's "Longsheng" series watermelon varieties. The significance of achievement transformation lies in bringing more excellent research results from the laboratory to the fields, giving farmers better seeds to plant, better technology to boost yields, and better machinery to improve efficiency. Wu Hongda, deputy director of the academy's Achievement Industry Department, told attendees that in the first half of this year, the academy focused on the transfer and transformation of staple crop varieties, with 75 varieties transformed and contracts totaling over 60 million yuan. Since 2023, the academy has ranked first among provincial research institutes in transformation for three consecutive years, and its variety-based achievement transformation remains firmly in the top tier nationally, comprehensively unlocking the full chain of scientific achievements moving from laboratories to fields and markets.
As the front-end link of achievement transformation, agricultural research has run through the academy's entire development journey. From opening the curtain on cold-region agricultural research in 1956, to building systematic and normalized disease-resistant breeding and disease-control technology systems in the 1980s, from launching special research initiatives in the 21st century to secure independent control of seed sources, to now empowering Heilongjiang's modern agriculture through full-chain cold-region agricultural technology innovation—over the past seven decades, the academy has addressed development tasks at different historical stages, precisely solving the needs of Heilongjiang's agricultural development and injecting a steady stream of scientific strength into cementing the nation's food security cornerstone.
During the celebration, multiple high-level academic conferences and events attracted experts and scholars from across the country's agricultural science community. At the 2026 annual meeting of the China Agricultural Science and Technology Management Research Association's Agricultural Achievement Transformation and Intellectual Property Protection Working Committee held on the 18th, several old friends with deep ties to the academy shared their stories. Lin Xuchen, deputy director of the Achievement Transformation Department at the Fujian Academy of Agricultural Sciences, recounted a connection forged through rice. The high-quality, high-yield long-grain conventional japonica rice "Minlong No. 1" was jointly developed by the Fujian and Heilongjiang provincial academies over more than a decade, using south-north breeding, shuttle breeding, and multi-ecological screening to produce an excellent variety suited to Northeast rice-growing regions. It features high and stable yields, early maturity, wide adaptability, rice blast resistance, and salt-alkali tolerance, and has already been transformed and adopted in Heilongjiang. "The successful cultivation of 'Minlong No. 1' demonstrates win-win cooperation between research institutions across different regions and climatic conditions. Through inter-provincial scientific collaboration and industry-academia partnerships, we can serve the nation's seed industry needs—I'm full of anticipation for further cooperation," Lin said.
Zhu Longfu, vice president of Shihezi University who previously worked at the academy for many years, noted that during his time in Heilongjiang, he deeply felt the academy's significant contributions to modern agricultural development in the province. He expressed hope for strengthening cooperation between universities and research institutes in agricultural technology innovation, jointly conducting talent cultivation and staple crop research and development, accelerating achievement transformation, and supporting industrial development in both regions.
The details of this 70th anniversary celebration showcased the warmth of agricultural science. Every gift bag presented to attendees embodied the wisdom of the academy's various research teams: Longmin black pig sausage supported by the Animal Husbandry Research Institute, linden honey from the Mudanjiang branch, hand-torn vegetarian meat from the Heihe branch, and grain porridge from the Food Processing Research Institute. These small gifts serve as a microcosm of how agricultural science flowers benefit the people, witnessing the entire journey from experimental fields to household tables, allowing seven decades of agricultural science excellence to nourish people's lives in the warmest, most down-to-earth way.
"Firmly practicing the concept of industrial technology, focusing research and development on national strategies and industrial needs, deepening grassroots achievement transformation, and promoting deep integration of technological and industrial innovation—these are essential requirements for building a strong agricultural nation and the sacred mission that agricultural science workers should undertake," said Chinese Academy of Engineering Academician Zhang Xinyou in his keynote address, articulating the original aspiration of generations of researchers rooted in the fertile soil and committed to tackling challenges.
Through seventy years of passing the torch, the academy has consistently followed this direction, allowing research to take root in the fields and achievements to benefit millions of households. On the cold-region black soil, seeds of innovation continue to break ground, and agricultural science flowers bloom one after another. Standing at a new starting point, the mission continues and cultivation never stops—the agricultural science blossoms of Heilongjiang hold even greater promise for the future.