Agricultural exports to qualitatively raise Far East agricultural development to new level - Skrynnik
MOSCOW. Aug 29 (Interfax) - The increase of exports of agricultural products to the Asia-Pacific region markets will bring the Far East agricultural complex to a qualitatively new level of development, head of the International Independent Institute of Agrarian Policy, Elena Skrynnik, who was the agriculture minister in 2009-2012, said.
"A full-fledged entry on the Asia-Pacific region market, most of all China, will allow for modernizing agricultural production in the Far Eastern region, to diversify the assortment of exports by increasing the supplies of grain, sugar beet and other crop products," Skrynnik told Interfax yesterday at the Eastern Economic Forum.
She said that the focus of Far Eastern agricultural businesses on exports, raising relevant foreign investments should be based on the observance of domestic interests of food and ecological security. Such a principle is set down in the export food doctrine, which was developed by the International Independent Institute of Agrarian Policy.
"The implementation of new agricultural export start-ups in the Far East is facilitating a favorable investment climate, innovations in the field of land use, 'the Far East hectare', private capital investments in transport and logistical projects," Skrynnik said, emphasizing the geographical closeness to economic and food centers of the Asia-Pacific region and also the natural resource potential as the main export advantages of the region.
In the medium term, amid the increasing imbalance between the rise in food consumption and the reduction of global reserves of fresh water and agricultural land, Russia in general and the Far East in particular will play a key role in providing global food security, most of all in the Asia-Pacific region, Skrynnik said.
According to the International Independent Institute of Agrarian Policy, in China, in connection with intensive use, arable land has degraded by about 20%-40%. Increasing demand for food in this country significantly surpasses domestic opportunities. Amid such conditions, reaching self-sufficiency is impossible, the country is quickly increasing its dependence on imports, experts said.
In her turn Skrynnik said that Russia is country number one for agricultural resource provision, growth potential for the production of ecologically clean products. "These advantages will allow our country in the next 15-20 years to become the largest global exporter of food, to hold 15% global market share, increasing the sum of agricultural exports to $150 billion," she said.
Namely the export food doctrine is aimed at this, the implementation of which envisages, in particular, the introduction of accumulated advanced international experience of the latest technologies in breeding, seed technology, genetics, and also the development of transport logistics.
According to the forecast of the Food and Agriculture Organization of UN, by 2050 global demand will double for fresh water, no less than 50 million hectares of arable land will be removed from turnover, the population will rise by 2.3 billion people, the main growth will come from countries of Asia and Africa.