2025 marks the 70th anniversary of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Civilization (Zhonghua Nongye Wenming Yanjiuyuan 中華農業文明研究院; hereafter, the Academy) based in Nanjing. Originally named the Institute of Chinese Agricultural Heritage (Zhongguo Nongye Yichan Yanjiushi 中國農業遺產研究室), the Academy was founded in 1955 under the direct guidance of Premier Zhou Enlai, specializing in the history and culture of agriculture. To this day, it remains the only national-level research institution of its kind in China. With the mission to “study and promote China’s long-standing agricultural history and splendid agricultural culture” and to integrate this work with “contemporary economic and social development” (Wang), the Academy was merged into the College of Humanities and Social Development at Nanjing Agricultural University in 2000. Building on its extensive specialized collections (Figure 1), the Academy further established the Center for the Digitalization of Agricultural Historical Documents (Shuzi Renwen Yanjiu Zhongxin 數字人文研究中心) in 2018.
Figure 1. A corner of the collections preserved at the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Civilization (provided by the Academy).
The most esteemed collection at the center is Products in Local Chronicles (
Fangzhi Wuchan 方志物產), a massive agricultural compilation drawn from Chinese gazetteers spanning over a thousand years from the Tang dynasty to the Republican era. Digitized from a rare handwritten corpus, its 70-year journey illustrates how such materials have been preserved through digital means and continue to serve academia with enduring vitality. Initiated in the 1950s under the leadership of Wan Guoding 萬國鼎, an early director of the Academy, the project amassed a collection of 30 million characters (“Introduction of the Database”, Figure 2). As a monumental work in the field of agricultural history, it became affectionately known as “the Red Books” (Hong Bao Shu) and has served generations of scholars across disciplines and universities. However, with only one handwritten copy in existence, its fragility limited continued access and use. In the early 2000s, the Academy launched a digitization program inputting the contents into computer. This effort further spurred the expansion of the collection beginning in 2008, growing its contents to 49 million characters and enabling the development of a full-text searchable database (“Introduction of the Database”).
Figure 2. The Dean of the College of Humanities and Social Development at Nanjing Agricultural University, Lu Yong 盧勇, introduces the birth of Products in Local Chronicles at the 70th anniversary of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Civilization on November 29, 2025 (photographed by the author).
As Professor Zhu Suoling 朱鎖玲 and Bao Ping 包平 (2021) of the Academy note in their article, agricultural history naturally occupies an interdisciplinary position, bridging the natural and social sciences, and holds the potential to adopt diverse methodologies and approaches. The database of Products in Local Chronicles has enabled numerous scholars to experiment with interdisciplinary approaches and methods within the past years. In her 2011 doctoral dissertation, Zhu (2011) outlined the progression of Products in Local Chronicles from manual compilation to digital organization, discussed the approaches and challenges of applying modern information technology to systematize local chronicle materials. This foundational work paved the way for a steady flow of academic output in the years that followed. For instance, Li Kongqing 黎孔清 and Bao Ping (2018) utilized GIS to visualize the distribution of pear cultivation areas, cultivated varieties, and the migration routes of white pear introductions across China during the Ming and Qing dynasties. Li Na 李娜 (2023) conducted quantitative and visual analyses of the relationships between objects and people as recorded in Products in Local Chronicles. With the approval of several national projects in recent years and advancements in emerging technologies, the field has begun to integrate artificial intelligence. Zhao Wenjuan 趙文娟 and colleagues, taking the knowledge graph of epidemic-related produce as an example, employed deep learning models to advance the in-depth mining and constructed a classification system for epidemic-related products (Zhao et al., 2025). Under the interpretive framework of digital narrative, Sun Yuefan 孫悅帆 and others embarked on innovative research, highlighting the value of regional produce in three aspects: tracing the origins of germplasm resources, multi-dimensionally shaping the cultural memory of produce, and deepening the integration of regional cultural and tourism industries (Sun et al., 2025).
The Academy’s latest achievement is the launch of a publicly accessible database titled China’s Historical Products (Zhonghua Lidai Wuchan Shujuku 中國曆代物產數據庫), available at https://wuchan.ancientbooks.cn (Figure 3). The design and development of this database followed a deliberate process, informed by the Academy’s extensive expertise with historical texts and a series of methodical surveys. According to Bao Ping and Lü Jinwei 呂金偉, key contributors to the project, the team conducted surveys among university researchers nationwide to identify the needs of potential users (Lü and Bao, 2022). The findings revealed that the most commonly requested features were knowledge retrieval, knowledge analysis, and knowledge presentation (Lü and Bao, 2022). In response, the database was designed with a user-centered framework, incorporating entry-based technology that allowed users to see search results across multiple manuscripts and local chronicles from various dimensions.
Figure 3. The main page of “China’s Historical Products” Database.
Specifically, the database employs a consolidated search result display. From the website’s main page, users may select one of three primary categories: “Local Chronicles: Produce,” “Local Chronicles: Classified Materials,” or “Local Chronicles: Comprehensive Materials.” Search results are then presented in three distinct formats: sorted by relevance, organized by collection volume title, or arranged by gazetteer title. For refined searches, an advanced search option allows users to narrow the scope across multiple dimensions, including region, product category, volume title, and gazetteer title. Further precision can be achieved through secondary filtering and period-based selection. For any query, the results display concise excerpts containing the matched keywords, making the content directly accessible to the public (Figure 4). Together, these features enable efficient navigation through centuries of agricultural records, transforming archival data into interactive, research-ready knowledge.
Figure 4. The keyword “Wheat” (Xiaomai 小麥) generates 5417 search results, for example.
The research articles published by the Academy members, along with the establishment of the dedicated database, demonstrate how agricultural history can serve as a vital hub for Digital Humanities and reveal its significant potential bridging other academic fields. On a broader level, this work contributes to the preservation of agricultural civilization, which modern Chinese define as their “root and soul,” and its innovative application in the digital age. As the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Civilization marks its 70th anniversary, we are reminded of both its profound legacy and its forward-looking role in shaping interdisciplinary scholarship.
References
Li Kongqing and Bao Ping, “The Regional Distribution and Cultivation Types of Pear in Ming and Qing Dynasties Based on “Local Chronicles Products”,” Agricultural History of China 37, No. 5 (2018): 21-29.
Li Na, “Construction and Analysis of the Social Network between Products and Characters in Local Chronicles: Produce,” Agricultural History of China 42, No. 2 (2023): 41-51.
Sun Yuefan, Zhao Wenjuan, Xu Chenfei, and Bao Ping, “Theoretical Logic and Countermeasure Exploration of Empowering Local Chronicles and Product Knowledge Services with Digital Narratives,” Library Tribune (2025-12-02).
Wang Siming, “President’s Address,” www.icac.edu.cn/English/President_s_Address.htm (accessed on 2025-12-4).
Zhao Wenjuan, Bao Ping, Xu Chenfei, and Lin Litao, “Construction and Application of Domain Knowledge Graph in Products in Local Chronicles,” Digital Humanities, No. 1 (2025): 52-69.
Zhu Suoling, “Research on the Application of Named Entity Recognition in Content Mining of Chinese Local Chronicles” (Ph.D. diss., Nanjing Agricultural University, 2011).
Zhu Suoling and Bao Ping, “Practice and Thoughts on Digital Humanities in the Research of Chinese Agricultural History: Taking the Digital Humanities Project of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Civilization as an Example,” Journal of Library and Information Science in Agriculture 33, No. 8 (2021): 79-87.
Lü Jinwei and Bao Ping, ”Digital Humanities Research for the Needs of Agricultural History: Centering on the Knowledge Base of Produce in Local Chronicles,” The Chinese Journal for the History of Science and Technology 43, No. 2 (2022): 163-176.
“Introduction of the Database,” https://wuchan.ancientbooks.cn/intro (accessed on 2025-12-4).
