Over 4,000 years ago, HouJi, who is said to be the earliest agricultural official in Chinese history, taught people how to plant and cultivate crops in Yangling. Today, the Yangling demonstration zone, known asa national agrarian hub, plays a crucial role in advancing China’s agricultural modernization.

As the earliest high-tech agricultural demonstration zone in China, Yangling not only gathers a cluster of agricultural universities such as Northwest A&F University, seed research and development companies, and agricultural innovation teams, but also attracts an increasing number of scholars and experts from Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) countries. ILocated in the central hinterlands of China, the small town of Yangling has become a demonstration zone for the modernization of Chinese agriculture. How did it achieve this status? How did the products of China’s “Silicon Valley for Seeds” take root in foreign countries, especially in the member states of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO)? Alexander Kubyshkin, a host of the CICG Center for Europe and Asia, visited Yangling in Shaanxi Province with Pakistani student Abdul Ghaffar Shar to uncover the answers during their expedition.