Citrus

With a long history of citrus planting and a unique ecological advantage, Chongqing is one of the most suitable areas for citrus growing in the world and is also the advantage citrus growing area in China planned by Ministry of Agriculture. Citrus grows in 38 prefectures and counties in Chongqing, 20 of them distribute along the Yangtze River Valley with the planting area and yield accounted for more than 75% of the whole city.

There are five characteristics of Citrus industry in Chongqing: First of all, it has a good industrial foundation. Through the rapid development in recent years, a standard orchard with virus-free container nursery has newly been built, which has the coverage of 600,000 Chinese acres. There are 40 fruit gardens, each of them covers the area of 2000 Chinese acres. The total citrus planting area in Chongqing amounts to over 2 million Chinese acres, the output 1.5 million tons, the value of gross output is more than 3 billion yuan. Second, it has advanced technology of seedling nursery. Chongqing is the first to establish a three-level citrus virus-free propagation scheme. 11 breeding fields for citrus container nursery all together has the greenhouse nearly 40,000 square meters, the screen house nearly 60,000 square meters, with the production ability of 10 million containerized citrus trees and 12 million budwoods. We have reached the goal of factorization in breeding, formalization in production and standardization in system. Many aspects such as producing capability, technology and seedling quality are leading the way in China. Third, it has powerful process capability. Companies such as American Bronfman Citrus Company, Beijing Huiyuan Group and Macao Ganges Fruit Co. Ltd. have been introduced to Chongqing to process orange juice. Many local companies, such as Chongqing Shangshufang Beverage Company, the Three Gorges Construction Group and Chongqing Tianbang Company have been established for fresh fruit processing and sales. The yearly capability of processing and package amounts to more than 1.5 million tons. Fourth, it has a strong safety barrier. Chongqing is the first virus-free area for citrus production in China. We have published the Rules for Construction and Management of Virus-free Citrus Area, and have established the prevention and control system which consists of stereoscopic epidemic monitoring points at different stages and inspection stations distributing on the road, market, dock and bus station in order to guarantee Chongqing to become “a pure land” for citrus growing and to promote its competitive ability in the international citrus market. Fifth, it has a great future. In the next five years, we will establish one million Chinese acres of standard orchard mainly for late-harvest citrus and rebuild 200,000 Chinese acres of old orchard. We will achieve the goal to make Chongqing become the virus-free citrus area with coverage of 3 million Chinese acres and yearly total output of 4 million tons. Chongqing will be the largest late-harvest citrus production base and the orange juice process base in China.