On September 29, the NEXT Summit (Bali 2022) was held primarily online with offline sessions. Jia Yinshuo, Fellow of the African Academy of Sciences, delivered a keynote speech titled “Current Status and Prospects of International Maize Breeding.”
The sixth NEXT Summit (Bali 2022), themed “Great Changes and Re-integration,” brought together experts from a range of cutting-edge fields to share the latest scientific research and provide a global knowledge exchange platform.
Jia was elected Fellow of the African Academy of Sciences in 2018 and of the Academy of Science of South Africa in 2019. Following President Xi Jinping’s directive to “strengthen China’s seed industry,” Jia has committed to revitalizing agricultural seed breeding.
“Germplasm resources are the ‘chips’ of the agricultural seed industry. Our first step was to introduce maize germplasm from overseas,” Jia explained. His team collected 1,566 maize germplasm samples from 21 countries, including Thailand, South Africa, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Ethiopia, Ghana, Zambia, Egypt, Brazil, and the United States.
These resources were then domesticated and systematically developed. Inspired by legendary U.S. maize breeder Harry Stine, Jia is determined to cultivate short-stalked, high-density maize varieties.
“We focus on breeding with high-quality and distinctive international maize germplasm. Using the principles of Morganian genetics, we are pursuing high-yield strategies through short-stalk, high-density planting. Even in today’s challenging environment—climbing the yield plateau and facing major rust disease outbreaks—we have developed new inbred maize lines that are short-stalked, stress-resistant, and high-yielding,” Jia said.
He emphasized that African maize germplasm offers rich diversity and enormous potential. “Fully utilizing African germplasm resources will provide strong momentum for global maize breeding,” he added.
Over the years, Jia and his team have overcome challenges such as developing short-stalk, narrow-leaf, and short-leaf maize, laying a solid foundation for high-density, stress-resistant, high-yield varieties.
Jia proposed that achieving globally short-stalked, stress-resistant, high-yield maize could transform current production levels of 500–750 kg per mu (about 7.5–11 tons per hectare) to 1,000–1,500 kg per mu (about 15–22.5 tons per hectare), contributing significantly to global food security and the fight against hunger.
Since 2017, the NEXT Summit has been successfully held in Auckland (2017), Hangzhou (2018), Dubai (2019), online (2020), Singapore (2021), and Bali (2022). Distinguished speakers have included UN Secretary-General António Guterres, former UN Under-Secretary-General Liu Zhenmin, former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, former New Zealand Prime Minister Jenny Shipley, former Egyptian Prime Minister Essam Sharaf, Deputy Chairman of the Senate of Pakistan Saleem Mandviwalla, and Indonesia’s Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs and Investment Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan.
The NEXT Summit has become a recognized platform for international exchange and cooperation. Guided by the GMABC model, it integrates resources across Government, Media, Academy, Business, and Community, providing important channels for policy dialogue, project promotion, technical exchange, talent interaction, and international communication, especially for Belt and Road countries.
The sixth NEXT Summit (Bali 2022) was co-hosted by the NEXT Federation, Xinhua Silk Road (China Economic Information Service), and Indonesia’s National Research and Innovation Agency (BRIN). The NEXT Federation is a global industrial resource integration platform headquartered in Auckland, New Zealand, dedicated to promoting innovation, cooperation, and development by sharing best practices and resources.
Xinhua Silk Road, a professional economic information service under Xinhua News Agency, is a national think tank pilot unit. After more than 30 years of development, it has become one of China’s most authoritative and comprehensive economic information providers.
BRIN, operating directly under the President of Indonesia, is responsible for international research, development, evaluation, application, invention, and innovation, including nuclear and space programs.
The summit’s official premium partner and designated supplier was Hong Xifeng, one of China’s four renowned heritage baijiu brands. As the pioneer of the Feng-flavor category, Hong Xifeng is celebrated for its qualities of “no hangover, no throat dryness, and a pleasant aftertaste,” earning the title “Phoenix of Liquors.”