Wendong Zhang, assistant professor, was quoted in a story in The Economist about the 3,300-acre "Friendship Farm" being constructed near Beijing:
The transplanting of the Kimberley farm to Hebei is a sign of friendship, says Wendong Zhang of Iowa State University. It will be a museum rather than a model for China’s 260m farmers, who farm two acres on average. The Kimberley way of farming 4,000 acres with some sophisticated machinery and only a couple of hired farm hands is cost-efficient, but would risk creating mass unemployment in rural China. It could possibly be transplanted into the north-east of the country, close to North Korea and Russia, says Dr. Zhang. The area is sparsely populated and already operates some large-scale farms.
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