Recent years saw patent applications increase quickly in China as public awareness on intellectual property are growing. The number of patent applications has exceeded 1.3 million over the past decades.

The figure was released by Tian Lipu, vice director of the State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO) at the China Agricultural New and High Technology Forum which was opened in Yangling, a city of west China's Shaanxi Province on November 5.

The forum is an important part of the Eighth China Yangling Agricultural High-tech Expo that opened Monday in Yangling, the country's only state-level agricultural high-tech demonstration zone.

In the first half of this year, patent applications grew by 20 percent over the same period of last year, high above the growth rate of the national economy, according to Tian.

The rapid growth in patent applications indicates that people's awareness on the importance of intellectual property is increasing as the country is going to join the World Trade Organization in mid November, Tian said.