HARBIN, March 12 (Xinhua) -- Northeast China's Heilongjiang Province, the country's leading soybean production base, has selected 23 new soybean varieties for breeders, as the government has been committed to the breeding efforts in order to boost the yield, quality, and disease resistance of the crop.

Du Zhentao, chairman of a pilot modern agricultural cooperative in Hailun City, Heilongjiang, said he is ready to continue planting "Dongsheng 22," a new soybean variety that he tried last year.

He said the seeds developed by Li Yanhua, a researcher with the Northeast Institute of Geography and Agroecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, proved a yield per mu (about 0.067 hectares) exceeding 200 kg, much higher than before.

China is striving to achieve self-sufficiency of oil-bearing crops such as soybeans. The Heilongjiang provincial science and technology has implemented a biological breeding program to breed the new soybean varieties.

Heilongjiang's soybean planting area accounts for more than 40 percent of the country's total. This year, the province has set the target of adding 10 million mu of soybean plantation area to boost the output. Enditem

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