Jeonnam Agricultural Research & Extension Services, Focused Promotion of Subtropical Fruit Research

Active Response to Climate Change Including Global Warming Decided

[Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Yoon Jamin] The Jeonnam Agricultural Research and Extension Services announced on the 21st that it will intensively promote research on subtropical and tropical fruit trees to actively respond to climate change such as global warming.

To this end, a total of 20 projects with a budget of 1.03 billion KRW will be invested, including ▲ 9 projects worth 200 million KRW for the development and dissemination of new subtropical fruit varieties ▲ 4 projects worth 550 million KRW for the cultivation and industrialization of yuzu as a regionally specialized crop ▲ 4 projects worth 180 million KRW for customized technology development for new subtropical fruit trees ▲ 3 projects worth 100 million KRW for smart farm production technology and quality improvement technology development.

While continuously promoting the development of proprietary new varieties that farmers can utilize without paying royalties abroad, it also plans to introduce promising foreign fruit species and varieties to conduct regional adaptability evaluations.

To commercialize the yuzu industry, a representative regionally specialized crop of Jeonnam, research will be conducted on developing new varieties with fewer seeds and no thorns, establishing an early warning system to mitigate weather disasters such as cold damage, and developing various functional products reflecting the preferences of export countries.

Along with this, due to the recent increase in preference and consumption of domestic tropical fruits, research on facility cultivation of crops such as banana, pineapple, olive, apple mango, and passion fruit will also be given significant attention.

Additionally, through smart farm production technology development and field demonstration research on kiwifruit and figs, which are Jeonnam's comparative advantage crops, future-oriented farming convenience enhancement technologies will be developed.

The Agricultural Research and Extension Services has so far developed 22 excellent new varieties such as kiwifruit, loquat, and pomegranate, distributed them to about 500 farms covering 226 hectares, contributing to an annual farm income of 11.3 billion KRW.

Park Hongjae, Director of the Agricultural Research and Extension Services, said, “We will establish public-private networks by crop to not only conduct research and development but also to quickly link research outcomes to income. We will do our best to support the promotion of exports by inducing cluster formation and to create differentiated industrialization models through continuous on-site consulting.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.