The years spent squatting in fields studying wheat crops earned agronomist Li Zhensheng the praise of thousand of local farmers.

The 75-year-old scientist says those compliments are equal to the 5 million yuan award he received for his life's work from the State Scientific and Technological on Tuesday.

Over the last 50 years, Li has stubbornly stuck with his research to develop disease, heat and drought resistant strains of wheat. Thanks in part to his work, China's wheat harvest is almost five times greater now than when he began his work in the 1950's.

Li, born in 1931 in east China's Shandong Province, developed the "Xiaoyan No. 6" wheat with its first strains going into production in 1979.

Li has also introduced chromosome engineering technology that reduced the time required to develop and breed new strains of wheat from 20 years to 3.5 years.

In 1948, Li entered the Shandong Agricultural Institute in part because the school provided free room and board he said, adding "hunger promoted me to study wheat breeding."

He graduated in 1951 and became the first in his school to pursue further study at the China Academy of Sciences (CAS), China's top science think tank.

In 1956 disaster struck the northwestern wheat growth area which was hit hard by rust. It was the same year Li was assigned by the CAS to work in an agricultural institute of Yang Ling County, Shaanxi Province.

"Only when one goes through natural disasters can they truly understand what food really means," said the CAS academician.

China's total grain output was about 100 billion kilograms in 1956, but five billion kilograms were ruined by rust.

It took him more than 20 years to breed "Xiaoyan No. 6" and since 1979.It has spawned 79 varieties of wheat that are being grown in 20 million hectares.

China's grain harvest exceeded 490 billion kilograms last year, the third consecutive year yields have risen.

A former vice president of the CAS, Li now spends his spare time writing calligraphy but still works on the front line of the wheat genetic engineering. "He's often seen in fields with farmers," said one of Li's students.

Li's says he'll keep 500,000 yuan of his five million yuan (about 600,000 U.S.dollars) award for himself, but intends to invest the remainder in his research and to establish a scholarship fund to support poor students.

Source: Xinhua