Tasting competition during rice-harvesting season

An annual tasting competition for the mid-late-mature Songjiang Scent Rice No. 1018 was held on November 15 amid the fragrance of rice-harvesting season.

Sixteen rice industry organizations and family farms sent their newly harvested packages of rice to compete. Through judgement by industrial experts, Shanghai Songlin Rice Industry Co took home the gold award. Appearance, fragrance and taste were all judging criteria. Five experts from the Shanghai Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Shanghai Agro-Technology Extension Center and Songjiang Rice Research Institute gathered to taste the cooked rice. They gave their final scores based on more than 10 judging criteria.

Songjiang rice is a well-known rice product in Shanghai, having been selected among the National Products of Geographical Indication. Songjiang Scent Rice No. 1018, in particular, has been awarded with many gold prizes.

"From hybridizing to seed selection to final stabilization of the rice category, Songjiang Scent Rice No. 1018 has passed 10 years of selection. It now tastes good with a high yield and is highly adaptive," said Lu Mingchang, chief of the Songjiang Rice Research Institute and a major Songjiang Scent Rice seed-breeding scientist.

"The quality of this year's rice is as good as last year. Though affected by typhoons, some of the mid-late-mature rice was beaten down during the spike stage. Generally speaking, the overall weather conditions have been good," said Lu.

"The cultivated area of high-quality rice in Songjiang increased by 26,000 mu (1,733 hectares) to reach 70,000 mu. Among them, Songjiang Scent Rice No. 1018 covers 61,000 mu. Nicknamed Shanghai's grain house, the overall crop planting area in Songjiang is 150,000 mu, and this year's rice yield rice is expected to reach 86,000 tons," said Zhang Yuefeng, chief of the crop planting office at the Songjiang Agriculture and Rural Committee.

"Our sales volume is up three times compared to last year. Freshhippo, a digital retail platform, sells 8 tons of rice daily. At the peak time, our daily sales reached 30 tons," said Zhang Wen, chief of Songlin Rice Industry Co.