In an agricultural industrial farm in Hotan, Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, rice is thriving on three-tiered cultivation racks in a plant factory, thanks to vertical, multi-layered space utilization and soilless culture technology, which significantly boosts yield per unit area.
It takes just two months from planting to harvest, much shorter than the typical 120-150-day growth cycle for rice in China.
"We are growing the local Xindao-1 (new rice) variety, using rapid breeding technology," said Wang Sen, a researcher at the Institute of Urban Agriculture of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, to People's Daily.
The seedling period for the new variety is 15 days, and after transplanting the rice seedlings into the vertical cultivation slots, the entire growth cycle only takes 60 days, Wang added.
Read more at ECNS.