Hubei province is known as “the hometown of fish and rice” in China, acting as the important agricultural production base and the largest fresh water aquatic production base in China. It puts the crop plantation on the first place while making all-around development in forestry, animal husbandry, sideline production and fishery.
In 2007, the added value for agricultural, forestry, animal husbandry and fishing products increased by 4.7% over the previous year in terms of comparable prices. The total area for grain cultivation was 4.34 million hectares; the area for cotton cultivation was 0.42 million hectares; the area for oil-bearing crops was 1.27 million hectares. The total output of grain was 22.87 million tons, 0.77 million tons more than the previous year; the total output of cotton was 0.45 million tons, 4,300 tons more than the previous year; the total output of oil bearing crops was 2.82 million tons, 20,900 tons more than the previous year.
Hubei has an afforested area of 6.73 million hectares. In 2007, the forestation area amounted to 162,300 hectares; 20,046 million trees had been planted.