Yet, this blog had never been a news blog and avoided dealing with conspiracies; recent events concerning a wide scale Chinese technology theft efforts, forced me to focus on the topic which might have a further influence on United States' China policies.
Following a long time media and State focus on China's internet hacking attempts, recent events indicate another area for Chinese interests.Thefts from Midwestern US cornfields may be part and parcel of China's acquisition strategy in agriculture.
On March 2013, a manager for DuPont Agriculture, one of the biggest in mid USA, saw a Chinese man on knee, digging up one of the company's research fields in Iowa, while a second Chinese man stood nearby. One of them, Mo Hailong, claimed that they were attending to a conference and then both two ran off the scene in hurry, making the DuPont manager suspicious enough to report the incident to local authorities.
Mo and 5 alleged accomplices were arrested by FBI in 2013. The incident raised a few eye brows and it became a case of espionage of a massive industry , starved and green-eyed over foreign competition, and a lot of plot tied to power and manipulation.
Mo is proved to be acting on behalf of International Business of the Beijing Dabei Nong Technology Group (DBN Group). Mo's accomplice Wang Lei who was caught digging up seeds is also the vice chairman of Beijing Kings Nower Seed S&T Company. US intelligence confirmed that both companies were cover organizations connected to Chinese Red Army's Technology Department.
When former Chinese Communist Party Leader Deng Xiaoping launched economic reforms in 1978, he identified science and technology as the key areas for China's modernization and domination in the global markets. He later put forth Project 863 (State High Technology Development Plan) for catching up and surpassing Western powers, which also paved the way for China's widespread and organized know-how and technology theft efforts.
China has a clear desire for the seed technology. As a whole, China is facing an agricultural crisis both for its enormous population and for its live stock feeding. This presented an acute dilemma to Beijing, hence while its losing clean water and arable land, there is growing demand to wheat and meat on the streets. To deter the increasing problem; China is believed to be organized in US, as well as Argentina, Brazil, Eastern Europe, Israel and Turkey through its international trade companies, to be able to determine the seeding technologies and also to conduct field experiments within these mentioned countries.
According to FBI reports, imprisoned Mo and Lei had purchased their own agriculture plots in Iowa and Illinois between 2011-2013, where they were growing and experimenting the stolen seeds with their inbred seeds.Now, inbred seeds are self-pollinating and need to be crossed with other inbred seeds to create the hybrid seeds, which will easily be adjusted to desired climatic conditions. According to FBI, it takes 5-7 years to develop inbred seeds, and the cost of such a project will be around $30-$40 million.
China has a clear interest in hybrid seeds, as they are designed to be resistant to drought and pests. In particular they are resistant to soil salinity-which is a major problem for China's agriculture. Israel and Turkey have been working on their home-made national seed programs for over two decades and especially Israel proved itself to be a prominent world leader, with wide marketing opportunities.
Chine; with its military procurement projects and missile joint production agreement on the table, is prone to be interested in Turkish Seeds and it will not be a surprise if Beijing asks Turkey agricultural off-set opportunities.
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