Recently, the General Office of The National Development and Reform Commission announced the new list of National Engineering Research Centers, and the National Engineering Research Center for Efficient Utilization of Soil and Fertilizer based at SDAU was among them. The National Development and Reform Commission carried out optimization and integration of engineering research centers in the fields of new materials and energy conservation and environmental protection for the first time, and 38 of them were included in the new sequences management, including 20 in the field of new materials and 18 in the field of energy conservation and environmental protection.

National Engineering Research Center for Efficient Utilization of Soil and Fertilizer is supervised by Shandong Provincial Development and Reform Commission. SDAU, as the legal entity, builds the center jointly with Shenyang Agricultural University, Hunan Agricultural University, Kingenta Ecological Engineering Group Incorporated Company, Shandong Baoyuan Biotechnology Incorporated Company, and SDAU Fertilizer Technology Incorporated Company. Its predecessor was the National Engineering Laboratory for Efficient Utilization of Soil and Fertilizer Resources approved by the National Development and Reform Commission in 2011, and passed the inspection and acceptance of experts organized by national and provincial development and reform commissions in December 2015. Since its establishment, the center has presided over 317 national projects, including 12th Five-Year Science and Technology Support Plan, 13th Five-Year National Significant Research and Development Plan, National Natural Science Fund, and Special Project of National Agricultural Industry, and 408 provincial and other technology and test development projects. It has made break-throughs in many key core technologies which support national strategic tasks and drive the industry development, achieved a number of major technological achievements, and won 69 national and provincial science and technology awards, including 4 second prizes of National Science and Technology Awards, 16 first prizes of provincial and ministerial level, 2 ISO international standards, 12 national standards and 13 industry standards. The center holds 298 valid invention patents by the end of 2020.

Professor Min Zhang, executive deputy director of the center and the main author of the international standard for slow and controlled release fertilizer, said that the center would take this opportunity of optimization and integration to solve the urgent problems including low fertilizer utilization rate, imbalance of soil nutrients, lack of organic matter and thinning of farmland surface layer in national strategies such as food security production and green agricultural development, and contribute to the three major grain production areas of Huang-Huai-Hai, Northeast and the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River, or even the whole country. To realize the key core technologies of soil quality improvement, fertilizer reduction and efficiency improvement, and sustainable improvement of agricultural ecological environment, the center will make greater efforts on key technologies and engineering and industrialization technology research, and make new and greater contributions to guarantee food security and push forward the green development of agriculture in China.