People consider Japan the strongest country in Asia in agricultural terms, but worldwide it is not Japan or even the USA, but the Netherlands that leads in agriculture. It is only a small country in Europe, but it is the second-largest agricultural exporter behind the USA. The annual net export value exceeds 30 billion USD. People often describe the characteristic economy of the Netherlands as "a small country with a large industry".
People working in a packaging factory
The reason that the Netherlands is only behind the USA in terms of food export is the advanced processing industry in the Netherlands. Processing companies package fresh food non-stop and send it to markets across the world. The majority of these products are produced in other countries and then shipped to the Netherlands through Rotterdam. After the products are packaged, they leave the Netherlands again via air freight, railway transport, or shipping.
Chinese agriculture has already entered the era of "high production costs" with the Netherlands as an example. The cost price of agricultural production in China already exceeds the cost price in the Netherlands. Chinese production efficiency and competitive power is still behind the USA, which is the result of relative weakness in natural resources, labor force, agricultural machinery, and science and technology.
Data shows that the overall surface area devoted to greenhouse agriculture in the Netherlands reached 11 thousand hectares. This is roughly one quarter of the surface area devoted to greenhouse agriculture worldwide. Around 7.4% of the greenhouse surface area in the Netherlands is devoted to organic farming, while that percentage is only 0.4% in China. Farmers in the Netherlands also apply a considerably smaller amount of pesticide and fertilizer. While the Netherlands has a production of 54.4 tons of vegetables per hectare, China only has a production of 23 tons of vegetables per hectare. That is less than half, which shows how far ahead the Netherlands is in terms of agricultural production.
Source: iFresh Fair