Zhumadian Network News (reporter Xu Jiarui correspondent Liu Ge).Seeds are a special means of production with vitality, and they are the key factors that determine the yield and quality of crops, and are known as the "chips" of agriculture.
For more than half a century since graduating from Baiquan Agricultural College in 1968, he has devoted almost all of his energy to seed breeding and agricultural technology promotion. More than 40 years ago, he presided over the selection and breeding of the new sesame variety "Yuzhi No. 2", which was recognized as the first pure white sesame improved variety in China. After that, he successively launched 5 new varieties of white sesame seeds, all of which maintained the remarkable characteristics of pure white grain color, waterlogging resistance, high yield, high quality and pollution-free. Over the past 40 years, the national white sesame production area has expanded from Pingyu County, Henan Province to most of the Jianghuai region, and the products are exported to the United States, Europe, CIS, Japan, South Korea and other countries and regions. As the origin of white sesame and the agricultural products favored by domestic and foreign markets, "Pingyu white sesame" is one of the many sesame varieties in the country, and enjoys the reputation of "the first hundred grains in the Central Plains, the king of Pingyu sesame".
On the long road of seed breeding and agricultural technology promotion, he has made great contributions to the development of the national white sesame industry and the agricultural development of the province with the ardent enthusiasm and persistent pursuit of a party member intellectual.
He is Guo Guodong.
Bonding with farmers. At the end of 1946, Guo Guodong was born in a family of doctors in Chayuan Street, Runan County. Guo Guodong has been keen and studious since he was a child, and he aspires to become a doctor when he grows up. However, after taking the college entrance examination when he was 18 years old, he was admitted to Baiquan Agricultural College (now Henan Technical College) by mistake. This young man, who was born in a family of doctors and grew up in the city, unexpectedly became a "chosen farmer".
During his study at Baiquan Agricultural College, Guo Guodong studied Xi seriously, and always followed the head of the department, Huang Guangzheng, who had bred the "Bainong" wheat series varieties, and other teachers to learn Xi with awe. His diligent and diligent Xi attitude to study was highly praised by Huang Guangzheng and other teachers, and he became a leader among his contemporaries.
In October 1968, Guo Guodong, along with most of the other fresh college graduates, was sent to Unit 154 of Shenhu Farm in Tianmen, Hubei Province to receive military training and carry out the task of "reclamation".
Dressed in military uniforms without badges and cockades, this contingent of college students was organized into companies, platoons, and squads, and lived in the homes of local simple and crowded peasant households, digging ditches, building embankments, and cultivating fields in knee-deep lake mud in the cold winter months, and still fought tenaciously in the surging floods in the scorching heat ......of midsummerRelying on the revolutionary spirit of not fearing hardship and death, and the lofty ambition and pride of daring to teach the sun and the moon to change the sky, they worked together with the vast number of military and civilians to turn the vast and barren sunken lake into a beautiful picture of the world and a "granary" of the republic.
In the strict military training and heavy labor that lasted for more than a year, Guo Guodong, who had a thin physique, withstood the beating and training, which provided him with valuable spiritual nourishment and a source of strength for his lifelong growth and struggle.
In March 1970, Guo Guodong, together with 8 other educated youths, was sent to the Liwan Brigade of Miaowan Commune, Pingyu County (now Liwan Village, Miaowan Town). Zhang Dianqing, secretary of the party branch of the village, was a national model worker, who had ascended the Tiananmen Tower on October 1, 1969 to participate in the National Day ceremony. Zhang Dianqing attaches great importance to Guo Guodong, who graduated from the agronomy major, carefully cultivates and boldly uses it, so that this educated youth who has just joined the team serves as the captain of the second production team.
In the days and nights of eating, living and working with the villagers, Guo Guodong gave full play to his expertise, presided over the opening of science and technology night schools, and organized the masses to carry out agricultural applicable technology trainingBefore sowing wheat and cotton, close the seeds;In the production process, we strictly implement technical specifications such as water and fertilizer management, weeding, and pest control, and conduct on-site guidance and demonstration for the masses plot by plot. Under his leadership, the wheat and cotton production of the second team has achieved a bumper harvest: the yield of wheat per mu has increased from about 200 kg in the past to more than 300 kg, and the yield of lint per mu has increased from about 60 kg to more than 75 kg. The masses were overjoyed, and Zhang Dianqing regarded Guo Guodong as a baby, and sent him to help solve the problem if the production team was lagging behind. Since then, the overall production level and labor quality of the whole village have been significantly improved. This experience of joining the team provided Guo Guodong with a stage and opportunity to realize his own value, and made him more confident and determined to dedicate himself to agriculture.
Open Sesame!”
In March 1972, Guo Guodong was assigned to work in the Pingyu County Agricultural Bureau, and in the same year, he served as a technician at the county agricultural science station. In the case of poverty and whiteness, Guo Guodong began the process of tenacious struggle on the thorny road of scientific research.
Sesame seeds are afraid of waterlogging and disease, coupled with the local autumn waterlogging, crop diseases and pests are frequent, resulting in the highest yield of sesame per mu is less than 40 kilograms, and the minimum is only a few kilograms. How to breed new sesame varieties that are resistant to flooding, disease-resistant, and high-yielding is a difficult problem that agricultural researchers have not been able to solve for a long time.
In 1974, the Provincial Academy of Agricultural Sciences put a sesame breeding project in Pingyu and handed it over directly to the fledgling Guo Guodong. While presiding over the project tasks issued by the provincial institute, Guo Guodong also took the initiative to cultivate and breed new sesame varieties that are resistant to waterlogging, disease-resistant and have good yield, and carefully selected "Xiongzhi No. 1", which is short and high-yielding but has poor waterlogging resistance, as the female parent, and "Ezhi No. 1", which has a high plant height and waterlogging resistance but low yield, as the paternal parent, and began the breeding of new sesame varieties tentatively named "Pingzhi 7627". Subsequently, he launched a series of scientific research to cultivate more and better new varieties of grain and oil crops that are needed for agricultural production and for the peasants' livelihood.
Sesame is a self-pollinating crop, and the flower buds only take two days from the open crown to full bloom, and the emasculation and pollination must be completed during this period. In addition, at around 4 p.m. on the day when the buds are dewed, the stamens in the female buds must be removed and pollinated at 6 to 8 a.m. the next morning. This places very high demands on breeding. Guo Guodong worked hard in the experimental field from morning to night every day, meticulously doing the work of emasculation and pollination. In 1975, a major flood disaster occurred in the Zhumadian area. Guo Guodong didn't care about his wife who was about to give birth at home, waded waist-deep in the floodwater, used a raft to snatch out the sesame strains that were about to mature, and tied them in the forest one by one.
After several years of hard work, in 1983, Guo Guodong's research and development of "Zhuzhi No. 2" sesame seed promotion results won the third prize of the provincial first;In 1985, the new sesame variety "Henan No. 1", a breeding project of the Provincial Academy implemented by him, won the second prize of the provincial scientific and technological progress award. In particular, the new sesame variety "Pingzhi 7627" independently selected and bred by him was officially named "Yuzhi No. 2" after four consecutive years of regional trials and production demonstrations across the country, which increased the yield by more than 14% compared with the best performance "Zhongzhi No. 7" at that time. Because this variety is China's first pure white sesame improved variety, the product color is pure white, high quality, not only hot in China, but also exported to the United States, Europe, Japan, South Korea and other countries and regions without inspection.
In 1996, Guo Guodong, who knew the destiny of heaven, was appointed as the director of the county agricultural bureau. Guo Guodong is well aware of the extreme importance of talents for career development, he resolutely withstood all kinds of pressure, arranged outstanding professionals to the most suitable position one by one, and successively accepted a large number of agricultural college graduates, focusing on training.
In 2022, Guo Guodong and Yang Xiaomei will provide on-the-spot guidance on the yield of 100 acres of sesame seeds (data map).
After retiring in 2005, Guo Guodong rented more than 10 acres of land out of his own pocket, and continued to engage in the breeding of new sesame varieties with his wife Yang Xiaomei (associate researcher, retired employee of the county agricultural science station). In the past 18 years, they are unwilling to enjoy a comfortable life, and secretly compete with the national agricultural research institutes to achieve results: the "Yuzhi No. 18" white sesame variety selected and bred passed the national and provincial examination and approval in 2008, and won the second prize of the city's scientific and technological achievements in 2009The "Yuzhi No. 19" white sesame variety was approved by the national and provincial levels in 2014 and won the second prize of the Municipal Science and Technology Achievement AwardThe white sesame variety "Yuzhi No. 20" was recognized as a new sesame variety by the National Sesame in 2015 and the first prize of the Municipal Science and Technology Achievement Award in 2016The selected and bred "Yuzhi No. 21" was recognized by the national new sesame variety in 2019 (no longer approved and identified), and won the second prize of the provincial agricultural science system in June 2022. In 2019, 73-year-old Guo Guodong was awarded the title of researcher.
The true nature of a public servant. The selection and breeding of improved varieties is the eternal theme of agricultural development. Every new variety comes out and goes through a long and complex process. From his youth to his frost-dyed temples and full of hair, he has always been concerned about agriculture and farmers, never forgetting his original intention, bravely undertaking his mission, and always maintaining his true character as a public servant with selfless dedication.
In order to carry out the cultivation and selection of improved varieties, Guo Guodong not only spent his life's efforts, but also invested more than half of his and his lover's salary. Especially in the 18 years since his retirement, Guo Guodong has paid for everything from renting land to purchasing fertilizers, pesticides, and farm tools, to research and experiments.
Combined with the actual situation of agricultural production and the needs of farmers, he presided over the compilation of the "Agricultural Efficient and Applicable Technology Manual", which covers grain and oil crops, vegetables, special crops, non-facility efficient agriculture and other planting technologies and operation specificationsHe personally compiled and printed a number of technical foldings such as "80 100 kg of standardized cultivation technology of white sesame" and "operating procedures for 400 kg of wheat yield per mu", and insisted on modifying, adjusting, improving and upgrading the content of the fold every year, and used it as a long-term agricultural technology training material for the county.
In the promotion of new varieties of white sesame series, Guo Guodong has adopted the method of promoting them in batches. He selected 6 townships and more than 60 large sesame growers as pilots to carry out regional trials and production demonstrations. He often rides a bicycle and electric car alone to the pilot towns and planting bases for on-the-spot inspections, and immediately communicates with local cadres and masses when he finds problems, conducts face-to-face consultations, and comes up with specific solutions.
At the same time, Guo Guodong insisted on being a good staff assistant of the county party committee and the county, and constantly made suggestions and suggestions for agricultural development. In the autumn of 2021, Guo Guodong found in the investigation that the white sesame planting in the county was on a downward trend, so he submitted a research report on "Stabilizing the County's White Sesame Planting and Consolidating the Response Strategies of Pingyu Oil Production Base County" to the county party committee and county, and put forward a series of opinions and suggestions on supporting professional cooperatives and the development of large planters.
In recognition of Guo Guodong's significant contributions, the provincial people awarded him the title of provincial model worker, and awarded him the honor of "national expert with outstanding contributions", and enjoyed special allowances.