Soybean on saline-alkali ground: a measured harvest in Heilongjiang

On a Heilongjiang farm where every field is meadow saline-alkali soil, an independently measured harvest put the bio-coupling demonstration 10.4% above the untreated control — the same Aspergillus–Rhizobia Coupling science our Orvan™ range delivers.

On 9 October 2025, a field-measurement and observation meeting was held at Sifangshan Farm, part of the Beidahuang Group in Heilongjiang, for the soybean quality-and-nitrogen-fixation programme built on bio-coupling. It was convened by the National Agro-Tech Extension and Service Centre, the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences and the Heilongjiang Academy of Agricultural Sciences, with the CAAS Oil Crops Research Institute (OCRI-CAAS) among the co-hosts. The harvest was cut and weighed in front of the panel: 190.2 kg per mu — about 2.85 t/ha — which is 10.4% above the untreated control.

The ground this was measured on

What makes the number worth reading is where it was taken. Every one of the farm’s 115,200 mu — roughly 7,680 hectares — is meadow saline-alkali soil, with a pH between 7.5 and 8.8 and, on the worst blocks, salt content of 3‰ to 5‰. Soil like that is low in fertility and holds water poorly, and it is precisely the kind of ground where rhizobia survive badly and nodulation quietly fails. The farm began working with CAAS and the Heilongjiang academy in 2023 on exactly this problem.

Sifangshan Farm demonstration, measured 9 October 2025

	Figure
Measured yield, demonstration block	190.2 kg/mu (~2.85 t/ha)
Against the untreated control	+10.4%
Farm area, all saline-alkali	115,200 mu (~7,680 ha)
Soil pH	7.5–8.8
Salt content, worst blocks	3‰–5‰

Two seasons apart, in the same field

The clearest read on this ground is not the percentage but the change between visits. In autumn 2023 the soybean here stood no more than about 70 cm, set few pods, and the stems took real effort to pull from the soil. In autumn 2025, in the same field, plants were over a metre tall, the canopy closed properly at the top, the grain was fuller and rounder — and the stems came out of the ground easily by hand. Looking at the roots, the panel noted markedly more nodules than in previous years, and nodulation that stayed active longer into the season. On saline-alkali land that last point matters twice over: it is what feeds the crop, and it is what starts rebuilding the soil for whatever follows.

Two bundles of soybean plants shown side by side at the demonstration, the treated plants visibly denser and carrying more pods — Treated plants (right) beside conventional ones — denser podding on the same saline-alkali ground.

The technology, and the variety underneath it

The bio-coupling technology was developed by the team of Academician Li Peiwu at OCRI-CAAS. Applied in the field as a microbial inoculant, it is built to induce nodulation and nitrogen fixation efficiently, to cut fertiliser and emissions while raising yield, and to improve safety and nutritional quality. It has been named among China’s national lead-promotion agricultural technologies and among its Top 10 Major Leading Agricultural Technologies, and after the Heilongjiang academy adapted and matured it for local conditions it was selected as a national lead-promotion technology again in 2025.

Biology alone does not carry saline-alkali ground, and the demonstration did not ask it to. The measured block was sown to Zhonglongdou 167, a soybean bred by Bi Yingdong’s team at the academy’s Institute of Crop Cultivation: about 120 days from emergence to maturity in its adapted range, 40.89% protein and 19.55% oil. It serves as a demonstration variety under a national key R&D programme on the genetic basis of salt-alkali and other stress tolerance in wild rice and soybean resources. Good seed and good method, measured together.

How far it has been taken

This was one site of many. Under the National Agro-Tech Extension and Service Centre’s coordination, the Heilongjiang Academy of Agricultural Sciences ran large-area bio-coupling demonstrations at 29 locations across the province in 2025, seven of them at 1,000 mu (about 67 ha) or larger, spanning the province’s different production regions and soil types.

Where our Orvan™ range fits

The bio-coupling at the centre of this work is the same Aspergillus–Rhizobia Coupling that our Orvan™ range is built to deliver commercially. Applied alongside the crop’s rhizobia, it amplifies nodulation and nitrogen fixation rather than replacing the partner already in the soil — which is exactly why it has something to offer on ground where that partner is under stress. A result measured this way, by an expert panel, on land this difficult, is the kind of validation that stands behind what we put in the furrow.

The takeaway: on meadow saline-alkali soil at pH 7.5–8.8, an independently measured harvest put bio-coupling 10.4% above the untreated control, at 190.2 kg/mu — with visibly stronger, longer-lasting nodulation than the same field carried two seasons earlier. It is the same coupling science our Orvan™ range delivers.