The world's largest agricultural weather observation network has been established

（Source: China Innovation and Technology）

On the 6th, reporters learned from the China Meteorological Administration that our country has built the world’s largest agricultural meteorological observation network. This network, constructed based on an integrated “space–air–ground” monitoring mode, is becoming a “scientific and technological shield” to safeguard national food security, and a “digital engine” driving the development of smart agriculture.

According to the latest data from the China Meteorological Administration, the meteorological departments have already built a modern agricultural meteorological observation system, including 642 manual observation stations, 738 automatic observation stations, 15 featured service centers, and 91 experimental stations. The operational framework of “complementary manual and automatic observations, coordinated observation and experiments” not only effectively addresses the weak links in observations in core agricultural areas, but also expands the view to hundreds of kilometers in the upper atmosphere through a satellite remote sensing monitoring system.

In major grain-producing areas such as Henan, by integrating 48 phenological observation systems with Fengyun satellite and drone data, agricultural departments can produce monitoring products with a resolution as high as 10 meters, so that every jointing stage of winter wheat and every inch of soil moisture can be “seen, distinguished, and judged accurately.”

“The biggest feature of this observation network is the combination of ‘intelligence’ and ‘accuracy.’” Wu Dongli, deputy director of the system room at the Meteorological Detection Center of the China Meteorological Administration, said. With advanced technologies such as AI, laser, and hyperspectral, our country has become the only country in the world that has a complete set of automatic crop development-stage observation data, with core data accuracy of 90% or more.

This kind of “smartness” is being transformed into productive capacity to combat natural disasters. In terms of pest and disease prevention and control, meteorological departments have innovated and developed pest and bird monitoring and identification technologies based on multi-band radar, which can finely identify and track the flight trajectories of migratory pests, providing precise decision-making support for the departments of agriculture and rural affairs. In crop monitoring, through the fusion of hyperspectral and multimodal data, researchers can conduct quantitative monitoring of crop chlorophyll content and physiological-level changes, realizing a shift from “depending on the sky to make a living” to “knowing the weather and farming accordingly.”

The real-world effectiveness of this observation network has been vividly verified in this year’s spring farming and in the improvement of crop yield per unit area.

In the southern rice major-producing areas, the high-standard farmland meteorological observation stations newly built jointly by the Hunan meteorological departments and the agriculture and rural affairs departments have played the role of “sentries.” By monitoring the temperature and humidity inside seedling-raising sheds in real time, the system automatically pushes alerts for risks such as high-temperature scorching and helps guide farmers to ventilate in time.

Observation data are used not only for early warning, but also to standardize agricultural production standards. In response to the increasingly widespread use of plant protection drones for aerial spraying operations, meteorological departments took the lead in formulating the industry standard 《Meteorological Grade for Plant Protection Drone Aerial Spraying》. In Jiangsu, the smart agricultural meteorological service system releases real-time forecasts of flying suitability levels, helping large growers precisely plan the operation window, not only shortening the pest and disease prevention and control cycle by 30%, but also saving significant pesticide costs every year.

Experts said that from the “agricultural condition dispatches” transmitted by the Fengyun meteorological satellite constellation to minute-level disaster alerts at the field level, through chains of precise data, this agricultural meteorological observation network is deeply rooted in the “field ridge” with “cloud-based” technology, providing solid meteorological support to help keep China’s “rice bowl” firmly in hand.

（Source: Science and Technology Daily | Author: Fu Lili）

Vast amounts of information and precise interpretation—available on the Sina Finance APP