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This paper explores the dynamics of the collaborative innovation network of China's agricultural biotechnology, from a spatial-topological perspective. The data pertain to a collection of patent applications jointly filed by universities, research institutes and enterprises on the mainland of China during 1985–2017. Using the logistic model, we first identify the developing phases of China's agricultural biotechnology. By dismantling the collaborative innovation network into spatial and topological networks, the dynamics are analyzed from these two dimensions at the three levels of nodes, edges and whole network. The results indicate that with the technology developing from the introduction to the growth-to-maturity phase, the collaborative innovation network exhibits dynamics as follows: as the scale expands, collaborations in the network are concentrated core cities, while dispersing to more innovators; enterprises replace universities and become the main innovation forces; the network attributes of small-world, scale-free and core-edge structures are apparent. Multi proximity factors including geographical, cognitive and organizational, play key roles in driving the dynamics, and the main factor evolves from geographical proximity to cognitive as well as organizational proximity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Agricultural Science & Technology (1008-0864) is the property of Journal of Agricultural Science & Technology and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

China's research and development (R&D) policy has changed considerably over recent decades, and great changes occurred in 2006 when the main programme objective of China's R&D changed from the 863 Programme and 973 Programme to the National Science and Technology Major Project. One topic that has drawn extensive attention is whether the investment reform improved R&D productivity in China. Using a unique panel dataset from 160 universities, this paper examines the effect of the investment reform on productivity improvement in China's agricultural biotechnology sector. We use a panel count data model with a dynamic feedback mechanism to model the knowledge production process. Strong evidence indicates that the investment reform greatly contributes to knowledge output production in China's agricultural biotechnology sector. We also find that the input quality is more important than the absolute quantity; human research capacity exhibits the greatest contribution to the output of patents; past knowledge accumulation helps produce more patents; and entry barriers to patent production exist in China's agricultural biotechnology sector. Moreover, the patent explosion in China may have been largely caused by improvements in the human capital input quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China has been investing heavily in biotechnology to increase agricultural productivity. While a number of Chinese developed GM crops have cleared the required scientific hurdles – some more than a decade ago – commercialization has not been approved. The regulatory regime for GMOs in China is relatively less well understood than that of the US or the EU. This paper provides a systematic overview of China's regulatory regime, R&D investment and delayed commercialization decisions on biotechnology over the last 40 years and draws some conclusions regarding the likelihood of the commercialization for major GM crops in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Agricultural Science & Technology (1008-0864) is the property of Journal of Agricultural Science & Technology and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Journal of Agricultural Science & Technology (1008-0864) is the property of Journal of Agricultural Science & Technology and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Purpose The Chinese Government has used a number of policies to encourage commercial agribusiness firms to do more innovation. These include public sector agricultural research and development (R&D), public sector biotechnology research and innovation, subsidies for commercial research, encouraging foreign firms to invest in China as minority shareholders in joint ventures, and allowing commercial companies to raise money on the stock market. The purpose of this paper is to assess whether these policies were effective in stimulating innovations by commercial firms in China.Design/methodology/approach This study estimates the impact of public biotech research and other policies by employing an econometric model of patenting by commercial firms. It uses a unique data set collected from commercial agribusiness firms for the years 2001, 2004, 2005, and 2006. Addition data were collected from public research institutes and universities and patent data from the Derwent Innovations Index database. It employs four count data models for the empirical analysis.Findings This study finds a positive impact of public biotechnology (measured by the number of biotech patents of government research institutes and public universities) on commercial innovation measured by the number of patents granted to the commercial firms. As expected the firm’s research expenditure and having their own R&D center (as opposed to contracting R&D or no R&D investment at all) have a positive and statistically significant effect on the number of patents granted. The impacts of public R&D investment spending have no statistically significant effect on commercial innovation. Multi-national firms and publicly traded firms have fewer patents than their counterparts suggesting that policies to encourage multi-nationals and financing through stock markets had no impact on innovation.Originality/value This study is one of the first studies to untangle the relationship between government policies and innovation by commercial agricultural research output and public R&D investment and biotechnology. The main findings suggest that simply increasing research money to public research does not increase commercial innovations, but moving resources to the development patentable biotech does improve commercial research productivity. The results also suggest that policies to increase commercial research will also increase innovation. These could include strengthening the legal framework and institutional resources for public institutes to the protection and enforcement of intellectual properties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper mainly analyzes the application data of patents concerning Hevea brasiliensis in the world and China from the perspectives of time, research field, and the geographical distribution of applicants. It also interprets the patents for invention in China from time, research field, and types of applicants. Based on the study, it shows that although the patent applications fluctuate, the general trend is rising. And the patents are mostly concentrated in plant protection, and agricultural biotechnology. The Chinese applicants of patents for invention largely work in the research institutes, and most of these patents focus on the field of plant protection, agricultural biotechnology, and agro-processing. However, the foreign applicants mainly work in companies, and most of these patents only focus on plant protection. These findings wiil provide a reference for formulating development policies about natural rubber industry in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The road ahead, legally, for gene editing in agriculture has various barriers to entry emerging in overseas markets. The liability landscape in the USA could make such overseas trade barriers, when they disrupt trade, into billion-dollar liability lawsuits here in the USA. The recent Syngenta litigation over China disruption sets a high standard for seeking regulatory approval that many companies may find daunting. Given the high costs and delays that could now be associated with regulatory approval, the benefits of this technology could be denied to a waiting public. Unfounded fears and misguided notions of sustainability in agriculture, which exclude gene editing in agriculture, could also play a part in denying the benefits of this technology. These challenges could take a generation or longer to correct. Outreach to key stakeholders overseas might allow this technology to gain acceptance, if it can avoid the stigma often associated with "GMOs" in foreign markets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the contribution of Jikun Huang, founder and director of the Center for Chinese Agricultural Policy (CCAP) to a wide range of issues on agricultural and rural development. Topics discussed include significant influence of his work on China's agricultural policies; his contribution towards the policies and reforms related to the market rain, R&D investment and agricultural biotechnology; mentions about his research works and achievements in the field of agriculture.

Rice is a facultative short-day plant (SDP), and the regulatory pathways for flowering time are conserved, but functionally modified, in Arabidopsis and rice. Heading date 1 (Hd1), an ortholog of Arabidopsis CONSTANS (CO), is a key regulator that suppresses flowering under long-day conditions (LDs), but promotes flowering under short-day conditions (SDs) by influencing the expression of the florigen gene Heading date 3a (Hd3a). Another key regulator, Early heading date 1 (Ehd1), is an evolutionarily unique gene with no orthologs in Arabidopsis, which acts as a flowering activator under both SD and LD by promoting the rice florigen genes Hd3a and RICE FLOWERING LOCUST 1 (RFT1). Here, we report the isolation and characterization of the flowering regulator eading ate epressor1 (HDR1) in rice. The hdr1 mutant exhibits an early flowering phenotype under natural LD in a paddy field in Beijing, China (39°54'N, 116°23'E), as well as under LD but not SD in a growth chamber, indicating that HDR1 may functionally regulate flowering time via the photoperiod-dependent pathway. HDR1 encodes a nuclear protein that is most active in leaves and floral organs and exhibits a typical diurnal expression pattern. We determined that HDR1 is a novel suppressor of flowering that upregulates Hd1 and downregulates Ehd1, leading to the downregulation of Hd3a and RFT1 under LDs. We have further identified an HDR1-interacting kinase, OsK4, another suppressor of rice flowering under LDs. OsK4 acts similarly to HDR1, suppressing flowering by upregulating Hd1 and downregulating Ehd1 under LDs, and OsK4 can phosphorylate HD1 with HDR1 presents. These results collectively reveal the transcriptional regulators of Hd1 for the day-length-dependent control of flowering time in rice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent decades, China's agriculture has been experiencing flourishing growth accompanied by rising pesticide consumption, fertilizer consumption, energy consumption, etc. and increasing CO emissions. Analyzing the driving forces of agricultural CO emissions is key requirements for low-carbon agricultural policy formulation and decomposition analysis is widely used for this purpose. This study estimates the agricultural CO emissions in China from 1994 to 2011 and applies the Logarithmic Mean Divisia Index (LMDI) as the decomposition technique. Change in agricultural CO emissions is decomposed from 1994 to 2011 and includes a measure of the effect of agricultural subsidy. Results illustrate that economic development acts to increase CO emissions significantly. Agricultural subsidy acts to reduce CO emissions effectively and has increased in recent years. Policy is needed to significantly optimize agricultural subsidy structure and change agricultural development pathway, if China's low-carbon agriculture target is to be achieved. This requires not only decreasing pesticide consumption, fertilizer consumption, energy consumption, etc. but also transformation of China's agricultural development path for optimal outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China has developed its own strong biotech program as well as a biosafety regulation system for genetically modified (GM) commercial production and import, but has yet started to seek approval for its GM events in any foreign country. China's biosafety regulations on biotech crop import, which requires that import applications start after approval from the country of origin and the zero tolerance rule, will have important implications for major GM producing countries that export GM products to China in terms of trade, price, and production and also to China itself in terms of food price and economic welfare. As China continues to expand its biotech crop commercialization, to minimize its trade conflicts with its exporting destination countries, China may also need to revisit its current policy of not seeking approval for its GM events in its major export destination countries in the future. A less trade-distorted regulation on low level presence (LLP) can benefit from the comparative advantage of agricultural production, stabilized domestic food price, and increased total social welfare. Global cooperation should be set up to enhance the safety management and also lower the multifarious and unnecessary costs of LLP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]