Founded in 1933, the Institute of Industrial Crops focuses on major scientific and technological issues in the industrial development of cotton, canola, legumes, medicine and food homology crops, and special industrial crops in Jiangsu and China. The Institute has also conducted research and extension in areas of germplasm resources, genetic breeding, cultivation physiology, and crop resistance identification.

Since the “Eleventh Five-Year Plan”, the researchers in the Institute have won 18 national, provincial, and ministerial awards, including the Chinese Government’s Friendship Award, China International Science and Technology Cooperation Award, the first prize of Jiangsu Science and Technology Progress Award, the second prize of Jiangsu Science and Technology Progress Award, the first prize of China Agricultural Science and Technology Award, the second prize of National Agriculture, Animal Husbandry and Fishery Harvest Award, and Jiangsu Provincial Government Friendship Award.