Group members accompanied by Prof. Peng Zhang visited Tai’an Academy of Agricultural Sciences and Shandong Agricultural University during their stay for planting transgenic sweetpotato on May 17-20, 2009 at Tai’an City. The visit strengthens our collaborations with breeders and field experts of sweetpotato.

Tai’an Academy of Agricultural Sciences has a glorious history and rich experience in sweetpotato breeding. Several well-known cultivars, such as Xushu 18, Lushu 8, Zhongtai 8, were bred at the institute, which has made a great contribution for national sweetpotato breeding programs. During the round-table discussion with the delegation, President Ji’an Cao gave a detailed introduction of the institute’s achievements on crop breeding, cultivation techniques and biotechnology, especially in sweet potato breeding research. He also exchanged his opinions with Prof. Peng Zhang on how to establish an effective and long term bilateral collaboration in sweetpotato study. Later, the group members guided by Senior Agronomist Guiling Liu and Director Jianli Zheng visited the field for sweetpotato evaluation, seed nursing greenhouse. They also demonstrated with the visitors the process of sweetpotato grafting for promoting flowering in sweetpotato breeding Garden.

During the visit of Shandong agricultural University, the group members had a round-table discussion with colleagues from the College of Agriculture. Professor Chunyu Shi introduced his study on sweetpotato cultivation technology and showed his great interest in collaboration with SCCB. Prof. Peng Zhang gave a brief review of major research topics of cassava and sweetpotato biotechnology at SCCB and expressed the wiliness to work together on analysis the performance of transgenic sweetpotato. Then, the group visited the State Key Laboratory for Crop Biology and Cereal Quality Supervision and Testing Center, Ministry of Agriculture.

The visit not only expands our knowledge of sweetpotato breeding and cultivation, but also bridges the gap between laboratory research and field study.