Abstract:
Abstract: Based on the review of the current status and perspectives of worldwide agricultural aviation (AA) and completive analysis of the technology demand, the development strategies of aviation plant protection in China were recommended. The main restricting factors to the development of AA industry in China were pointed out, which including the imperfect policies and regulations of AA at present, lack of supporting core technologies, qualified AA professionals, understanding on AA, public support to the development of AA, and defective social service system in AA, etc. And then the countermeasures to promote the rapid and healthy development of AA in China were put forward, which including the adoption of multi-type and multi-operation models to improve the applicability of AA, increasing the capital investment to enhance the core technologies research, fortifying targeted policies to strengthen and standardize the management of AA. Finally, the demand prediction of agricultural aircraft type in China was conducted by using empiric estimation demand prediction method. The demand prediction analysis shows that the AA industry in China has not really started, and the market will dramatically increase. In the coming 15 years, the AA aircraft type in China will mainly include manned fixed-wing aircraft, manned helicopter, gasoline-powered unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), battery-power UAV and others, and the working area to the whole cultivated area of all of these aircraft type will be about 5% by the end of 2015, 20% by 2020, 40% by 2025, 50% by 2030 respectively. It was estimated about 46.5 billion RMB of the new investment on AA aircraft type in next 15 years. With the relevant system and supporting core technologies improving continuously, the AA industry will get a healthy, orderly and rapid development in China.