China indicated Wednesday that if Taiwan wishes, it may send crop seeds for space experiments on the Shenzhou V spacecraft, expected to fulfill the nation's first manned space flight sometime later this year.

"Crop seeds in Taiwan like rice may be carried on board the Shenzhou V if our counterparts in Taiwan wish," said Liu Luxiang, a researcher with the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences in an exclusive interview with Xinhua.

According to Liu, China's mainland, which is reaching maturity in space breeding of crop seeds, is willing to reinforce cooperation with Taiwan on agricultural sciences in a bid to promote the common development of agricultural technology on both sides of the Taiwan Strait.

Since 1987, Chinese scientists have sent more than 70 kinds of crop species on eight space missions and successfully cultivated a series of improved agricultural products with high-yield and high-quality, including rice, wheat, tomato, green pepper and sesame.

China's Science and Technology Minister Xu Guanhua said Tuesday that preparations for China's first manned space flight are moving ahead "smoothly".

A successful mission would make China the third country after Russia and the United States to launch a manned spacecraft.

(Xinhua News Agency September 18, 2003)