An intelligent harvester operates in a Tongzhou district field. [Photo/ntfabu.com]

Tongzhou district – administered by Nantong city in East China's Jiangsu province – has greatly expanded its smart agriculture in recent years, in response to the national development strategy for rural revitalization.

Efforts are understood to have been made to promote the use of new equipment, popularize new technologies and train new farmers. At present, the district has established three unmanned farms.

Nantong Huajia Agricultural Machines Co Ltd built one of them – in Jiangyi village in Liuqiao town – and last week an intelligent harvester was used to harvest wheat there.

The harvester is able to sense the direction required and move forward by itself using an "intelligent brain" – a Beidou terminal and assisted driving system for agricultural use.

Equipped with the system, the harvester can make use of the high-precision positioning information provided by satellites to achieve precise operations for automated travel, turning, U-turns and automatic obstacle avoidance.

Liuqiao town is a major grain-producing area in Tongzhou district. Due to the promotion of improved grain varieties – coupled with high-tech agricultural machinery and scientific field management – this year's barley production is said to have not been affected by the COVID-19 epidemic and is even higher than last year.