Sino-Russian agricultural cooperation

Agricultural cooperation is an important area for advancing pragmatic cooperation between China and Russia. Yet their agricultural cooperation lags far behind their industrial cooperation and their political and cultural interactions. To strengthen bilateral relations, deepen economic and trade cooperation, and promote interactive development of the border regions, China and Russia need to strengthen agricultural cooperation.

In fact, both governments have shown their support for agricultural cooperation.

In September 2009, the leaders of China and Russia approved a cooperative guideline for Northeast China and the Far East and East Siberia regions of Russia, emphasizing agriculture is the priority investment field and encouraging investments in agricultural technological cooperation and the construction of cooperative grain plants and other modern agricultural operations.

China's State Council vowed in its No 1 document of 2010 to boost the opening-up of China's agriculture, strengthen international cooperation of agricultural technology and agricultural resource development and support for Chinese agricultural enterprises seeking to explore the global market.

The State Council issued its guideline on the cultivation of new strengths in international cooperation and competition on May 24, 2012, which proposed that China should expand its agricultural cooperation with the outside world.

The Joint Statement of China and Russia inked during Russian President Vladimir Putin's state visit to China in June 2012 proposed China and Russia establish large-scale cooperation programs in agriculture and the other fields to promote the economic cooperation of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization.

In 2012, the Russian government proposed leasing millions of hectares of land in Russia's Far East to foreign investors and announced the country would build five agricultural product processing complexes in Primorsky Krai, Khabarovsk Krai, Amur Oblast, Sakhalin Oblast and the Jewish Autonomous Oblast by 2016 to guarantee the sustainable development of the region and regional food security.