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This speech provides firstly a quick overview of agriculture in China, and then it shares a brief analysis of cotton production under restructuring in a context where the strengthening of agriculture has gained momentum. The very recent measures targeted at strengthening agriculture are assessed through the prism of sustainability, namely the three pillars of social, environmental and economic aspects commonly acknowledged. The contemplated actions to enhance agriculture, with implications for cotton production, look like a set of challenges whose chances of being successfully overcome are appraised through a retrospective analysis of a few achievements related to former challenges. In China, agriculture lacks attractiveness for several decades since economy has been liberalized. Rural families on tiny farms lag behind in terms of income; they suffer from a continuously growing income gap in spite of an increasing share of wages through off‐farm activities. Families have been abandoning farming, making land available to increase the size of remaining farms while stronger labor constraint implies that the mechanization of more cultivation practices has become more crucial than ever. Cotton production, especially in the two traditional production regions of Yellow River Valley and Yangtze River Valley, is particularly touched by the described evolution of agriculture. It has become less and less attractive in front of competing crops, notably cereal crops, for lack of governmental support, for increased costs of labour, of fertilizers as well as of insecticides in spite of, or because of almost twenty years of Bt cotton use. Agricultural policy measures elaborated in March 2016 can be related to each of the three sustainability pillars. More precisely, about half of the measures correspond to one of the three social, environmental and economic dimensions, and the other half falls in between two dimensions. Retrospective analysis of a few innovations like China‐specific technique of transplanting, the widespread use of hybrid cultivars, the evolution of insecticide spraying devices, the development of cultivation machines adapted to moderate scale farming (although breakthrough achievement in mechanized harvesting has yet to come) point out a successful process of recurrent technology development based on a huge scientific and technical network motivated by an important potential market. In the last decades, China has demonstrated its capabilities to overcome technical challenges, but many challenges ahead, related to measures recently announced fall out of the technical sphere (like decentralization of land contract, insurance, credit guaranty…). Organizational and institutional innovations are required; they call upon successful interaction between producers and other stakeholders, be they public or private, and which should differ from top‐down and administratively-oriented procedures. (Texte intégral)

http://www.jpgervais.eac.ulaval.ca/actesAIEA2.pdf ; China is a big country in terms of biotech achievements. It is also a rare country demonstrating crop-differentiated policies in the dissemination of the GMOs. While the release of GMOs is authorized notably for cotton in 1998, it is still prohibited for food crops. In spite of the positive outcomes on cotton, at least in the short run, and of the persisting decrease of the cereal production, the hesitation to release GMO on food crops should keep on prevailing. This seems to be founded when the qualitative dimension of the food production is taken into consideration. ; La Chine est un grand pays dans le domaine des biotechnologies mais c'est aussi l'un des rares pays à manifester une politique différenciée dans la diffusion des OGM en fonction des cultures. Alors que la diffusion est autorisée notamment sur le coton depuis 1998, elle reste encore interdite sur les cultures vivrières. En dépit des résultats positifs obtenus sur le coton, au moins à court terme, et de la persistance de la réduction de la production de céréale, l'hésitation dans l'utilisation des OGM sur les cultures vivrières devrait perdurer, non sans fondement, car la dimension qualitative de la production alimentaire doit être prise en compte.

http://www.jpgervais.eac.ulaval.ca/actesAIEA2.pdf ; China is a big country in terms of biotech achievements. It is also a rare country demonstrating crop-differentiated policies in the dissemination of the GMOs. While the release of GMOs is authorized notably for cotton in 1998, it is still prohibited for food crops. In spite of the positive outcomes on cotton, at least in the short run, and of the persisting decrease of the cereal production, the hesitation to release GMO on food crops should keep on prevailing. This seems to be founded when the qualitative dimension of the food production is taken into consideration. ; La Chine est un grand pays dans le domaine des biotechnologies mais c'est aussi l'un des rares pays à manifester une politique différenciée dans la diffusion des OGM en fonction des cultures. Alors que la diffusion est autorisée notamment sur le coton depuis 1998, elle reste encore interdite sur les cultures vivrières. En dépit des résultats positifs obtenus sur le coton, au moins à court terme, et de la persistance de la réduction de la production de céréale, l'hésitation dans l'utilisation des OGM sur les cultures vivrières devrait perdurer, non sans fondement, car la dimension qualitative de la production alimentaire doit être prise en compte.

Les résultats d'une enquête récente en Chine confirment le succès de l'utilisation de variétés génétiquement modifiées de coton. Cette réussite n'est pas uniquement due aux qualités intrinsèques de ces variétés. Elle provient d'un ensemble favorable de facteurs techniques et économiques et surtout à des règles de diffusion très différentes de celles imposées dans les autres pays.

reproduction du texte dans une revue anglaise en fin 2008 ; In order to analyze the impacts of Bt cotton on the farmers' livelihood system, we interviewed 169 farmers and extension personnel in the main cotton production areas in Hebei province in the year 2002 and 2003. An integrative method was used in which a multidisciplinary approach was employed including agronomy, economics and sociology. The results showed that the application of Bt cotton increased the cotton growing area as well as farmers' income. For 67% of the farmers interviewed, cotton area has been continuously increasing since 1997. The cotton net margin in one cropping cycle came out to be higher than the combined net margins of wheat and corn in two cropping cycles. The income from cotton played a significant role in the investment to education, leisure and health care. The socio-economic impacts of cotton production are nevertheless not yet optimal because there were still many factors limiting them. Lack of labor and land were the main limiting factors. Productivity is restrained by the high price of Bt cotton seeds which pushed farmers to keep seeds from their own cotton production (42% of the farmers in 2002 and 2003). Farmers are still lacking technical command in using Bt-cotton: 78% of the farmers admitted that while more than 94% of the farmers complained not getting information from local extension and technical services. More success in using Bt-cotton calls upon going beyond providing seeds and asks for continuous assistance from research and extension department, notably to achieve a full knowledge of the Bt-cotton characteristic so as to optimally integrate it into the farmers' system. ; Dans le but d'analyser les impacts du coton-Bt sur la viabilité du système de production paysanne, nous avons interviewé 169 paysans ainsi que le personnel de vulgarisation dans la principale zone de production cotonnière de la province du Hebei au cours des campagnes 2002 et 2003. Une méthode intégrée a été utilisée en suivant une approche ...

reproduction du texte dans une revue anglaise en fin 2008 ; In order to analyze the impacts of Bt cotton on the farmers' livelihood system, we interviewed 169 farmers and extension personnel in the main cotton production areas in Hebei province in the year 2002 and 2003. An integrative method was used in which a multidisciplinary approach was employed including agronomy, economics and sociology. The results showed that the application of Bt cotton increased the cotton growing area as well as farmers' income. For 67% of the farmers interviewed, cotton area has been continuously increasing since 1997. The cotton net margin in one cropping cycle came out to be higher than the combined net margins of wheat and corn in two cropping cycles. The income from cotton played a significant role in the investment to education, leisure and health care. The socio-economic impacts of cotton production are nevertheless not yet optimal because there were still many factors limiting them. Lack of labor and land were the main limiting factors. Productivity is restrained by the high price of Bt cotton seeds which pushed farmers to keep seeds from their own cotton production (42% of the farmers in 2002 and 2003). Farmers are still lacking technical command in using Bt-cotton: 78% of the farmers admitted that while more than 94% of the farmers complained not getting information from local extension and technical services. More success in using Bt-cotton calls upon going beyond providing seeds and asks for continuous assistance from research and extension department, notably to achieve a full knowledge of the Bt-cotton characteristic so as to optimally integrate it into the farmers' system. ; Dans le but d'analyser les impacts du coton-Bt sur la viabilité du système de production paysanne, nous avons interviewé 169 paysans ainsi que le personnel de vulgarisation dans la principale zone de production cotonnière de la province du Hebei au cours des campagnes 2002 et 2003. Une méthode intégrée a été utilisée en suivant une approche multidisciplinaire associant agronomie, économie et sociologie. Les résultats montrent que le coton-Bt a fait augmenter les surfaces cotonnières ainsi que les revenus. Pour 67% des paysans enquêtés indiquent avoir continuellement augmenté la surface consacrée depuis 1997. Le revenu du coton, en un seul cycle se révèle supérieur au revenu combiné d'un cycle de blé et d'un cycle de maïs. Le revenu issu du coton joue un rôle significatif en faveur de l'investissement pour l'éducation, loisir et soins médicaux. Les impacts socio-économiques ne sont néanmoins pas optimaux car ils sont encore limités par divers facteurs. Le manque de main-d'œuvre et de terre en sont les principaux. La productivité est réduite par le prix élevé des semences de coton-Bt ce qui pousse les paysans à utiliser les semences de leur propre production (cas de 42% des paysans en 2002 et 2003). Les paysans manquent encore de maîtrise technique dans l'utilisation du coton-Bt : 78% des paysans l'admettent alors que 94% d'entre eux se plaignent ne pas obtenir d'information de la part des services techniques ou de vulgarisation. Un plus grand succès dans l'utilisation du coton-Bt suppose d'aller au-delà de la simple fourniture de semences et il interpelle pour une assistance continue en R&D, notamment pour parvenir à une connaissance complète des caractéristiques du coton-Bt pour pouvoir l'intégrer de manière optimale dans le système de production du paysan.