To do a good job in agriculture, rural areas and farmers, we must attach importance to fostering model examples

Comrade Xi Jinping pointed out: "Being good at fostering model examples, letting them lead the way and play a demonstrating role, has always been an important working method of our Party." In the work on "agriculture, rural areas and farmers," we should especially attach importance to fostering model examples and be good at doing so. How to make rural areas beautiful, how to make agriculture strong, and how to make farmers rich all require model examples to lead the way. There is no doubt that fostering model demonstrations is an important and effective working method for "agriculture, rural areas and farmers."

I

In recent years, Hainan has attached importance to fostering and establishing model examples in its work on "agriculture, rural areas and farmers," creating a large number of high-quality examples that on the whole present four distinctive features: First, comprehensive coverage. There are examples in every field and every link of the work on "agriculture, rural areas and farmers." For example, among typical examples, for winter melons and vegetables there is the Longpoyang melon and vegetable base in Chengmai; for the tropical fruit industry there is the mango base of Nantian Farm; for aquaculture there is the deep-water cage culture base in Lingao; for Nanfan breeding there is Shennong Dafeng Company; for the "vegetable basket" there is Luoniushan's supply of all categories of agricultural products; for financial services there is the provincial rural credit union's "Yixiaotong" small-sum credit for farmers; for science and technology services there is Agricultural Science and Technology 110; for farmers' cooperative organizations there is the Qiongzhong Fudao Rubber Cooperative; for the entire agricultural industry chain there is Sanya Rose Valley; for aquatic product exports there is Chengmai Xiangtai Fishery; for rural tourism there is Baoting Betel Nut Valley; for rural spiritual civilization development there is the nationally renowned brand - the civilized ecological village, and so on. All kinds of examples are too numerous to list. Second, novel concepts. Hainan's typical examples in "agriculture, rural areas and farmers" are like "lighthouses," each revealing from its own field a direction for the work on "agriculture, rural areas and farmers," disclosing a pattern in the development of "agriculture, rural areas and farmers," and leading new trends and new tendencies in that development. For example, Baoting County's "Betel Nut Valley" rationally uses ethnic minority customs, fully takes into account the interests of original residents, and preserves the original appearance of the village, thereby forming a model of harmonious and sustainable development; Sanya's "Rose Valley" integrates the primary, secondary and tertiary industries and forms the idea of full-industry-chain development. These are all advanced ideas and scientific methods that make one's eyes light up and inspire deeply. Third, outstanding benefits. Without benefits there is no model example; these examples have all brought farmers real, tangible returns. Shatu Village, Qiaotou Town, Chengmai County, grows selenium-rich sweet potatoes and follows a path of organization, scale, branding and industrialization. The per capita net income of farmers rose from less than 2000 yuan in 2006 to 13450 yuan in 2014. At the okra planting base in Xinlian Village, Fenghuang Town, Sanya City, the per capita annual net income of villagers reached 15000 yuan in 2014, a net increase of 4000 yuan compared with before okra was planted. Fourth, careful cultivation. Cultivating a model example is like educating a person; the cultivation of every example embodies the painstaking efforts of all parties and integrates relevant resources for common support. It can be said that leaders devote their hearts, the grassroots devote their feelings, and the masses devote their efforts. Some city and county leaders and some department and bureau leaders in Hainan are personally fostering model examples and carefully cultivating them. It can be said that they "have the overall situation in mind and model examples in hand."

II

A single flower does not make spring; only when a hundred flowers bloom is the garden full of spring. The purpose of fostering model examples lies in promotion; only when they are promoted can they play a demonstrating and driving role. Back then, if Xiaogang Village in Fengyang, Anhui, this model of the "household contract responsibility system," had not been promoted, it might have been submerged in the long river of history, but once promoted it opened the curtain on China's reform and opening up. Comrade Mao Zedong proposed "grasping typical experience and spreading it comprehensively." Comrade Xi Jinping also particularly emphasized leading the way with model examples and letting pace-setters show the way, and during his work in various places he personally took charge of model demonstration work. To create a flourishing situation in the work on "agriculture, rural areas and farmers," we must be good at promoting model examples so that they produce a rolling effect and an amplifying effect.

To sum up, the methods generally used in the past to promote model examples include promotion through meetings, on-site promotion, promotion through documents, media promotion, policy promotion, and so on. To improve the effectiveness of promoting model examples, we should further broaden our thinking, innovate methods, and focus efforts in three areas. First, extensively use the internet and even emerging methods such as WeChat and mobile customer service terminals. The internet has a natural advantage for promoting model examples. Online promotion has images, text, and audio-visual content, integrating the advantages of meeting promotion, on-site promotion, and document promotion, and has the characteristics of rapid and broad dissemination, long-term information retention, low-cost and convenient learning, and three-dimensional and intuitive presentation. Relevant functional departments can make more use of personalized customization, give play to departmental information advantages, implement precise and individualized promotion methods, and directly promote those well-done examples in a targeted way to farmers, farmers' cooperative organizations, and agricultural enterprises, rather than carrying out "flood irrigation"-style promotion. Second, strengthen the incentive mechanism for promotion. The incentive mechanism is the breakthrough point for promoting model examples. Current promotion of model examples involves more calls to action and less interest-driven motivation. Through policy design, everyone should gain benefits from promoting model examples, and a sound interest-driven mechanism for promoting model examples should be established. For those mature typical practices that need comprehensive promotion, certain financial subsidies or rewards may be given. For example, in rural tourism, what can be shown off are mostly things left by our ancestors, such as traditional villages from 100 or 200 years ago. But the houses built in rural areas in recent decades are of every kind, most of them "matchboxes." When left to future generations, I am afraid they cannot be called traditional villages; most are construction waste with no preservation value at all. To solve this problem, an interest-driven approach can be used, letting farmers build houses according to village plans and architectural drawings designed by housing and construction departments with rural flavor, regional characteristics, and ethnic features, and giving subsidies to those who meet the conditions, with subsidy standards adapted to local conditions. Third, better incorporate farmers, agricultural enterprises, and farmers' cooperative organizations into the promotion system. The main body of the work on "agriculture, rural areas and farmers" is the decisive force in promoting model examples. The main body of the work on "agriculture, rural areas and farmers" is farmers, agricultural enterprises, and farmers' cooperative organizations, and the ultimate work must land on farmers and enterprise entities. In the past, when promoting model examples, attention was often paid to promotion among officials, while farmers, agricultural enterprises, and farmers' cooperative organizations were given little consideration. In promoting agricultural and rural model examples, we must definitely take farmers, agricultural enterprises, and farmers' cooperative organizations into account.

For example, to promote a rural tourism model example, we should not only invite city and county leading officials to see it, but also organize farmers to see it. Only after seeing it can farmers feel how great the benefits of tourism are for them and learn the methods of doing rural tourism. Then when it is promoted and put into practice, farmers will not resist. Promoting model examples also requires advancing with the times, continuously consolidating and innovating, and promptly improving places that are still not perfect, so as to produce better promotion results, reach the realm of "flowers fragrant both inside and outside the wall," and prevent the awkwardness of "flowers inside the wall fragrant only outside the wall."

III

An open mind is the prerequisite for learning from model examples, and also the main cost of learning from them. Although many model examples have strong promotional value, the promotion results are often not ideal, and they often remain "a single flower blooming alone." What is the reason? Apart from some objective reasons, there is a very important subjective factor, namely that some comrades are not quite convinced in their hearts and not quite open-minded. Some comrades see much and do little; when they look they are deeply shaken, when they discuss they are excited, and after they return they still do not move. Some even treat model examples with a skeptical eye and a fault-finding attitude.

Comrade Mao Zedong said: "Modesty helps one go forward, whereas conceit makes one lag behind." For a country, a nation, a political party, a region, an organization, or an individual, how great the achievements are is closely related to whether one is open-minded in learning from others and whether one is good at learning from others. Comrade Xi Jinping wrote a special article, "Be Good at Learning from Model Examples," stressing that "learning knowledge is a kind of learning, and learning from others is a virtue," and that "how much, how deeply, and with what gains one learns from others depends on one's personal learning attitude and learning perspective. This is true when learning from ordinary people, and it is also true when learning from advanced model examples." Confucius said: "When three people walk together, there must be one among them who can be my teacher." Ordinary people all have something worth learning, let alone model examples!

Learning from model examples is the most cost-effective. This is because learning from model examples requires only an open mind, without paying tuition, and without bearing the costs and time paid by the practitioners of the model examples, while the gains are immeasurable. In every respect, learning from model examples with an open mind is necessary and worthwhile. In learning from and drawing on model examples, one must not demand perfection. A foot may be short and an inch may be long. A model example may also have some flaws and shortcomings; the correct attitude is to correct the flaws and shortcomings of the model example while learning its experience, and to surpass the model example in learning from it. Comrade Xi Jinping said, "In learning from others, different people have different views: a magnanimous person sees the strengths of others, a fault-finding person sees the weaknesses of others; a modest person learns from the strengths of others to cultivate himself, a conceited person uses the weaknesses of others to inflate himself; an optimistic person learns from others to encourage himself, a pessimistic person feels inferior and indulges himself." If you are a model example, I can draw on your experience and create a new model example; if you have ability, I can learn your ability, and that is true ability. As the saying goes, "A good learner borrows others' strengths to make up for his own weaknesses." If the vast number of workers on "agriculture, rural areas and farmers" can all learn from and draw on the experience of others with an open mind, using others' strengths to make up for their own weaknesses, then the spark of model examples in "agriculture, rural areas and farmers" will surely become a prairie fire.

IV

Seeking truth from facts is a basic principle for promoting and learning from model examples, and it is also a skill. Comrade Xi Jinping requires that "in learning from advanced model examples, there is much that can be learned! The most crucial thing is to learn their spirit, their qualities, and their methods." Then, how can we uphold seeking truth from facts in promoting and learning from model examples?

First, adapt measures to local conditions. "Local conditions" include different types of land such as fertile land, poor land, dry land, waterlogged land, sloping land, and flat land. Expanding the scope further, it also includes the effects of latitude, altitude, water sources, sunshine, and even air humidity and microorganisms, and so on. In agriculture, "adapting measures to local conditions" means doing whatever is suitable! If it is suitable for planting, then plant; if suitable for raising, then raise; if suitable for processing, then process; if suitable for cattle, then cattle; if suitable for sheep, then sheep; if suitable for pigs, then pigs; if suitable for seedlings, then seedlings; if suitable for fruit, then fruit - all are adapting measures to local conditions. In actual work, it is not easy to adapt measures to local conditions. Some places often do not study carefully, do not understand what the "local conditions" are, and then choose blindly. Seeing what others do and plant with good results, they come back and promote it regardless of their own conditions and circumstances, only to end up with losses and crushing failure. Therefore, in learning from model examples, one must learn the essence, see the essence through phenomena, learn their ways of thinking and methods, and learn their spirit. Drawing a tiger by copying a cat will not produce a tiger; mere copying will only produce "a jumble that resembles nothing."

Second, proceed step by step. The promotion and learning of model examples is a process, not something achieved overnight. Even a single birth requires ten months of pregnancy, let alone promoting and learning from model examples. Comrade Xi Jinping said that urbanization is a long-term historical process and must be advanced scientifically, orderly, actively and steadily, and one must not be impatient for success. Promoting and learning from model examples likewise requires no impatience for success; one needs to move forward step by step, and when conditions are ripe, things will naturally succeed, going with the flow. When encountering difficulties and setbacks, one should not be discouraged. As long as the direction is right and one persists, overcoming difficulties will surely lead to success.

Third, make innovations and breakthroughs. Creating model examples is innovation and breakthrough, and promoting and learning from model examples also requires innovation and breakthrough. In promoting and learning from model examples, one should study and overcome their shortcomings, and at the same time combine them with reality to make new creations and achieve new breakthroughs, striving to have the pupil surpass the master. When the Hainan Provincial Rural Credit Union was learning from Bangladesh's small-sum farmer loan experience, it precisely overcame the shortcomings of their small loan amounts and high interest rates, achieved a surpassing, and created the Hainan farmer small-sum loan model. It is precisely this kind of creative promotion and creative learning that can better give play to the demonstrating and driving role of model examples and promote the formation of a good situation of emulation, learning, catching up, and surpassing.