Move quickly to cultivate new drivers of agricultural growth, and uphold both quantity and quality

China News Service, November 15 - Li Wei, Director of the Development Research Center of the State Council, pointed out today that in the face of new conditions for food and food safety, we must move quickly to cultivate new drivers of agricultural growth, uphold both quantity and quality, balance the present and the long term, coordinate domestic and international efforts, and comprehensively enhance the capacity to safeguard food and food safety.

Guided by the Development Research Center of the State Council and jointly hosted by the Rural Economy Research Department of the Development Research Center of the State Council and the China Economic Yearbook Press, the “2015 (Third) China Food and Food Safety Strategy Summit” was held in Beijing on the 14th-15th. With the theme of “Transformation of Agricultural Development Mode and Succession of Growth Drivers”, the summit focused on how to promote the transformation of agricultural development mode and the upgrading of drivers with a view to agricultural modernization.

Speaking at the summit, Li Wei pointed out that China's per capita grain availability has reached 450 kg, slightly higher than the world average, and that a massive grain collection, storage, processing and distribution system has been established, markedly enhancing the availability of grain for urban and rural residents. The improvement in China's food and food safety situation has not only laid a solid foundation for China to cope with various risks and challenges in reform and development and maintain the stable operation of the economy and society, but has also made outstanding contributions to alleviating poverty and hunger worldwide.

Li Wei said that we must clearly see that the foundation for sustainable food and food safety is not solid, and that some aspects are still very fragile. Whether it is the external market environment or the internal allocation of factors, both pose new and very severe challenges to food and food safety in modern China.

Li Wei pointed out several prominent problems facing China in the field of food and food safety:

First, grain output has increased year after year, but the cost in resources and environment is too great. At present, the increase in China's grain output still basically follows the old path of relying on factor inputs. Water resources have already been over-exploited, and in many places the environmental capacity has been exceeded. The excessive use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides brings increasingly prominent environmental costs and economic costs. If grain production continues to overdraw resources and the environment in this way, the foundation on which agriculture depends for survival and development will continue to be destroyed. The sustainable growth of grain output in the future will inevitably face greater risks.

Second, the domestic grain market is increasingly affected by the international market. In recent years, the state has continuously raised the minimum purchase prices for rice and wheat and the temporary purchase and storage price for corn, effectively promoting grain production increases and farmers' income growth. However, as internal conditions change, the grain price support policy is also facing new challenges. The most prominent problem in the current temporary market is that the trend of domestic grain prices seriously deviates from the international market, and the problem of inverted domestic and international grain prices is becoming increasingly prominent. Inventory backlogs are serious and the fiscal burden is heavy. How to improve the price formation mechanism for agricultural products, improve the grain purchase and storage system, and coordinate the two markets and two types of resources at home and abroad is a major issue in the adjustment of China's agricultural policy.

⟦NL> Third, there are still many hidden dangers in food quality and safety. The situation of food quality and safety is highly concealed, and information asymmetry exists among producers, operators, consumers and regulators, making it difficult for the government to implement effective supervision. The existing regulatory capacity is seriously insufficient, and imported food quality and safety issues cannot be reassuring either. Affected by factors such as weak global recovery, sluggish consumer markets and continuously rising production costs, some food enterprises have reduced investment in quality management in order to maintain profits, and global food safety problems occur frequently.

Li Wei pointed out that in the face of new conditions for food and food safety, we must move quickly to cultivate new drivers of agricultural growth, uphold both quantity and quality, balance the present and the long term, coordinate domestic and international efforts, and comprehensively enhance the capacity to safeguard food and food safety. Measures can be taken in the following aspects:

First, persist in ensuring production capacity. China must adhere to the bottom line of basic self-sufficiency in grain and absolute safety of staple food, and maintain sufficient food safety and production capacity. Ensuring grain production capacity absolutely does not mean pursuing grain output growth at all costs and at the expense of resources and the environment. The production capacity to be ensured must be efficient, sustainable and healthy production capacity, and only healthy production capacity can truly safeguard food and food safety. We must implement the strategy of storing grain in the land and storing grain in technology, improve agricultural productivity, land output and resource use efficiency, and take the path of agricultural modernization featuring high output, safe products, resource conservation and environmental friendliness.

Second, persist in moderate imports. As a large developing country with a large population, little land and scarce water, China cannot sustain its growing food demand by relying only on local arable land. Actively using the international market and international resources is the general trend. Persisting in moderate imports first requires establishing a diversified and stable international trade system for agricultural products. We must enhance the stability of strategic trade relations, gradually release the production capacity of important trading exporting countries and grain production, and persist in moderate imports. We must also accelerate the pace of agriculture going global and prevent and defuse the risks that may be brought by purely imported agricultural product trade.

Third, persist in putting quality first. The food and food safety that China must safeguard is not only safety in quantity, but also safety in quality. It is necessary not only to ensure the quality and safety of domestic products, but also to promote and safeguard the quality and safety of imported products. We must start from the source of the industrial chain and do a good job in the quality of agricultural products. On the basis of cultivating new types of business entities and developing large-scale operations, we must promote the standardization, normalization and branding of agricultural production. On the one hand, we must purify the production area environment and cut off the chain by which pollutants enter farmland. On the other hand, we must actively carry out agricultural branding, shape, cultivate, recommend, market and promote it socially, and promote the improvement of agricultural product quality through brand effects.