Food Administration Deploys Autumn Grain Purchase and Storage Work, Actively Implements the Food Security Responsibility System

China Securities Journal Online News, November 9, learned from the Food Administration that on November 6, the National Food Administration and the Ministry of Finance, together with the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Agriculture, the Agricultural Development Bank, Sinograin and other departments and units, organized a symposium in Changchun, Jilin on autumn grain purchase and storage work in Northeast China, to implement the spirit of the State Council meeting held on October 30 on studying and doing a good job in grain purchase and storage and other work, and to guide and urge relevant local governments to carry out autumn grain purchase and other tasks well. The meeting was co-chaired by the National Food Administration and the Ministry of Finance. Responsible officials in charge of the people's governments of Liaoning, Jilin and Heilongjiang provinces and the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, relevant responsible officials from the development and reform commissions, finance departments, agriculture departments, food administrations, Agricultural Development Bank branches and Sinograin branches of the 4 provinces (regions), and relevant responsible officials from COFCO Corporation, China National Textile and Apparel Council Group Corporation and AVIC Group Corporation attended the meeting.

At the meeting, local governments and relevant central enterprises exchanged information on this year's autumn grain purchase and storage arrangements and progress of preliminary work, and studied and deployed the next steps. The meeting required that the importance of doing a good job in autumn grain purchase must be fully recognized, and that all policy measures must be implemented with all-out effort. First, make maximum use of social warehouse capacity, reasonably set up purchase and storage depots, meet farmers' grain-selling needs, and achieve full purchase of all grain that should be purchased; second, all localities must actively implement the provincial governor responsibility system for food security, promptly issue purchase measures for corn that does not meet quality standards, and at the same time strengthen technical guidance and services to help farmers reduce moldy corn as much as possible; third, organize and mobilize farmers to sell grain at the appropriate time, eliminate the mentality of holding back sales while waiting for prices, and avoid corn becoming moldy in farmers' homes and a rush of grain selling after the beginning of spring next year; fourth, strictly implement the purchase quality and price policy and settlement policy, and under no circumstances allow any form of deduction from grain-selling farmers or “IOUs”; fifth, do a careful and meticulous job in policy publicity and public opinion guidance. In addition, it is necessary to guide diverse entities to actively enter the market to purchase; strengthen production and marketing linkage, support enterprises in sales areas to purchase and replenish inventories in Northeast China; strengthen supervision and inspection, and severely investigate and deal with violations such as passing off old grain as new and “circulating grain”; and do a good job in safe grain storage and safe production, and from now on no longer use mat-and-bin storage for grain.