China, Sri Lanka cooperate to develop agriculture
DATE:2014-10-09 SOURCE:China Daily
By Ge Jieru ( www.cnchemicals.com )
Updated: 2014-10-08
Students visit the orchard of Chennong Agricultural Garden in Kunming, Yunnan province. [Photo/China Daily]
The Sri Lanka vegetables, fruits and flowers industrialization training session took place at Yunnan Agriculture University from Sept 9 to Sept 23. The training session was hosted by the China Foundation for Peace and Development. The China-ASEAN Education Center and the Yunnan Cadre Institute are the sponsors of the training session.
The 15-day training session was taught in English, and 15 talents from Sri Lanka's agriculture industry participated.
The training session included in-class training, case study and research seminars. The session covered Yunnan's horticultural industry development, Yunnan's cultivation techniques, agriculture industrialization development and modern agriculture sales marketing issues. During the training, students visited and investigated Yunnan's modern planting base. A symposium was also held, and representatives from Yunnan's agriculture enterprises and Yunnan's agriculture science and technology demonstration garden attended the symposium. "Even though students from Sri Lanka only have two weeks to study in Yunnan, they have changed a lot. At the beginning, the students could only use forks and knives and now they can use chopsticks quite well. These changes indicate Sri Lanka people's love of Chinese culture,' said Zhu Jiang, deputy secretary of Yunnan Agriculture University.
Piyasena Tennekoon, a student from Sri Lanka, said that Yunnan is a kingdom of plants.
"We are quite interested in how Yunnan realizes the extension of its flower industry. Also, we've investigated Yunnan Agriculture University's flower products, including flower lozenges and flower cake,' Tennekoon added. Anusha Nishanthi Nanayakkara, another student from Sri Lanka, said that they've learned a lot of agricultural theories and practical knowledge.
"Sri Lanka's agriculture industry is not as developed as here in China, we will use the knowledge we've learned in practice after we go back to Sri Lanka to make a contribution to Sri Lanka's agriculture industry,' Nanayakkara said.
Students learned the development of the vegetable industry and visited the standard vegetable production base in Tonghai, Yunnan province. Kong Baohua, professor at Yunnan Agriculture University, gave a lecture on pest control of horticultural plants. According to Nanayakkara, Professor Kong's lecture was very helpful. "Professor Kong is so nice and patient and we all like her,' Nanayakkara said.
On Sept 18, all the students from Sri Lanka performed the traditional prostration ceremony toward Professor Kong. The prostration ceremony shows the reverence to teachers in Sri Lanka.
"These students performed the prostration ceremony, and it's the highest reverence I've received in my 26-year teaching career,' said Professor Kong.
Sri Lanka is an island country off the southeast coast of the Indian subcontinent in South Asia. Sri Lanka has good natural conditions for developing its agriculture industry, while Yunnan has technical advantages in growing vegetables, flowers and tea. The training session provides the students a good opportunity to bring Yunnan's agriculture techniques back to Sri Lanka.
Students visit the vegetable garden of Chennong Agricultural Garden in Kunming,
Yunnan province. [Photo/China Daily]
Students visit the vegetable garden of Chennong Agricultural Garden in Kunming,
Yunnan province. [Photo/China Daily]