The history of China Agricultural University can be traced back to 1905 when the College of Agriculture was founded in the former
Imperial University of Peking. Beijing Agricultural University (BAU) was established in September 1949 through the merging of Peking University's College of Agriculture,
Tsinghua University's College of Agriculture and
North China University's College of Agriculture. In 1954, BAU was listed by the State Council as one of the Top-Six
National Key Universities as well as one of the Top-Ten Key Universities for further construction and improvement. In October 1952, BAU's Department of Agricultural Machinery, North China College of Agricultural Machinery and Ministry of Agriculture's Central Agricultural Mechanization School merged to form the Beijing Mechanized Agricultural College, which was renamed Beijing Agricultural Mechanization Institute (BAMI) in July 1953. The BAMI was listed by the State Council in October 1960 as one of the 64 National Key Universities and then renamed again as Beijing Agricultural Engineering University (BAEU) in 1985. In 1995, Beijing Agricultural University and Beijing Agricultural Engineering University merged as China Agricultural University (CAU). Since then, the university has become the top academic institution in China in terms of agricultural studies. Rugby re-emerged in the PRC in 1990, with a club formed at Beijing Agricultural University. A professor there, Chao Xihuang, was introduced to the sport by a Japanese businessman, and set up a couple of sides. Some of the earliest
China-Israel bilateral cooperation occurred at CAU, in the form of the Sino-Israeli Agricultural Training Center. == Rankings and reputation ==