Central China's Henan Province is one of the country's major grain production areas, producing a quarter of the national wheat output. But its contribution is more than just grains and food. The province is now striving to drive breakthroughs in key agricultural machinery technologies and revitalize its agricultural machinery manufacturing industry.
China's grain output hit a record high of 706.5 million tonnes in 2024, up 1.6 percent from 2023. This marks the first time that the country registered a grain harvest of over 700 million tonnes. Previously, the country's annual grain output had been above 650 million tonnes for nine consecutive years. And achieving the milestone is all thanks to modern agricultural innovation, improved technologies, quality, and sustainability.
At YTO Group, a leading Chinese agricultural machinery and construction machinery manufacturer based in Luoyang City, a 200-horsepower large tractor can be rolled off the assembly lines every 150 seconds, and 200 large tractors can be produced in a day. Such productivity is due to the intelligent production system.
Zhao Yirong, head of the technology center and general manager assistant of the First Tractor Company Limited under YTO Group, has been working for over 30 years in the company and has witnessed the smart development of agricultural machinery and the localization process of core technologies. He gave an example to show the company's relentless effort to localize a core part for power shift tractors.
"Our research and development team conducted 1.5 million wear tests, 5,000 gear shift tests, 10,000 commutation tests and 750 hours of field tests before fully localizing a clutch drum," he said.
YTO Group has established seven national-level sci-tech innovation platforms, with more than 1,400 technical team members. It has successively developed China's new-type tractors, breaking foreign monopolies, and has obtained nearly 2,100 invention patents, utility model patents, and software copyrights.
Its sales network spans more than 100 countries and regions worldwide.
Diesel engines are core components independently developed and produced by YTO Group. YTO diesel engines are not only self-supporting, but also can be supplied to more than 300 other agricultural machinery companies in Luoyang and even across the country.
"The annual production capacity of diesel engines is 300,000 units. Internal supply accounts for about 50 percent, and external supply takes up nearly 50 percent," said Wang Xiangyang, vice general manager of YTO Group's diesel engine company.
On Dec 30, 2024, a China-Europe freight train loaded with 40 containers of YTO tractors and spare parts was heading to Kazakhstan. Currently, YTO Group makes three China-Europe freight train trips every week on average.
"In 2024, our [export] growth in Africa reached more than 50 percent," said Shan Chunyu, vice general manager of YTO Group's international economic and trading company.
Luoyang produced China's first crawler tractor in 1958. Now it's home to over 500 enterprises producing agricultural machinery equipment and related components, with the industry's total output value exceeding 30 billion yuan, or about 4 billion U.S. dollars. The city has an annual production capacity of 200,000 tractors and 50,000 harvesters.
China's Henan Province strives to drive breakthroughs in key agricultural machinery technologies
