Rural homestead land voluntary paid exit mechanism to be explored and established

Beijing Times graphic by Xie Yao

Original title: Rural homestead land to explore voluntary paid exit mechanism

The General Office of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the General Office of the State Council recently issued the "Comprehensive Implementation Plan for Deepening Rural Reform", which is the top-level design for China's current rural reform and a key deployment at a critical period for rural economic and social development.

According to the requirements of the plan, at present and for a period to come, deepening rural reform must focus on five major areas: the rural collective property rights system, the agricultural operation system, the agricultural support and protection system, the institutional mechanisms for integrated urban-rural development, and the rural social governance system. For the core issues of reform in these five major areas, the general direction, main content, and major guidelines and policies must be clearly defined, and reform thinking further clarified.

□ Property rights system reform: Specific plan to be issued for farmland contract extension measures

★ Carry out pilot reforms of rural land expropriation, entry of collective operational construction land into the market, and the homestead land system. Summarize experience in a timely manner, continuously improve it, and form replicable and promotable reform results. (See the graphic for the basic approach.)

★ Deepen reform of the rural land contractual management system. Promptly amend relevant laws, implement the central government's major decision to stabilize rural land contracting relations and keep them unchanged for the long term, and, at an appropriate time, put forward specific plans on matters such as farmland contract extension measures after the second round of contracting expires and the new contract term.

Interpretation

Clear property rights are the core of a market economy. At present, as China's market-oriented reform advances in depth, problems have become prominent in rural collective assets, such as unclear ownership, undefined rights and responsibilities, lax protection, and poor circulation. How can rural “sleeping assets” be brought to life and farmers enjoy more property rights? This has become an unavoidable issue for the next step of rural reform.

“On the path of a market economy, clarifying property rights is an unavoidable topic. The clearer rural collective property rights are, the stronger the vitality of the rural market.” Wang Yukai, a professor at the Chinese Academy of Governance, believes that at present China's rural collective property rights system reform is relatively lagging, which on the one hand prevents the potential of various rural factors from being activated, and on the other hand is not conducive to protecting farmers' lawful rights.

This plan places emphasis on this issue. The plan proposes that to establish and improve a rural collective property rights system that conforms to the requirements of the socialist market economy system and the reality of the primary stage of socialism, it is essential to take protecting the rights of members of rural collective economic organizations as the core and to focus on clarifying the ownership of rural collective property rights and granting farmers more property rights…… ensuring that the fruits of collective economic development benefit all members of the collective.

“Vigorously advancing reform of the rural collective property rights system is conducive to expanding sources of farmers' property income and to establishing a long-term mechanism for increasing farmers' incomes.” Ye Xingqing believes that further liberalizing land management rights, carrying out pilot projects for collective operational construction land entering the market, and advancing the confirmation of collective assets to households will all become highlights of future reform.

□ Agricultural operation system: Support migrant workers returning home to establish family farms

★ Cultivate a professional farmer workforce. Formulate special plans and feasible policies, attract young people to farming, cultivate new-type professional farmers, and build a high-quality workforce of new-type agricultural production and operation operators. Support migrant workers with skills and business capabilities to return home to establish family farms, lead farmers' cooperatives, and found agricultural product processing and marketing enterprises and agricultural social service organizations.

Interpretation

Grain production relies on the “386199” force, aging farmers, a lack of successors in agriculture, and low production efficiency…… “Who will farm the land” and “how to farm the land” constrain China's agriculture from becoming bigger and stronger.

In response, the plan proposes attracting young people to farming, cultivating new-type professional farmers, and building a high-quality workforce of new-type agricultural production and operation operators. It proposes accelerating the cultivation of new-type agricultural operation entities such as family farms, specialized large households, farmers' cooperatives, and leading enterprises in agricultural industrialization.

“Compared with small farmers, new-type agricultural operation entities such as family farms and specialized large households have certain production funds and scale, can carry out scaled operations, and have relatively considerable returns, which can solve the problem of ‘who will farm the land’; while professional farmers understand technology and are good at management, and can also solve the problem of ‘how to farm the land’, which is conducive to the transformation of traditional agriculture into modern agriculture.” said Dang Guoying, a researcher at the Rural Development Institute of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

Experts point out that the plan conveys a strong signal that the state will vigorously support new-type professional farmers and new-type operation entities, and it is expected that related policies in areas such as taxation and finance will clearly tilt in this direction in the next step.

□ Support and protection system: Current “three agricultural subsidies” to be merged

★ Establish a mechanism for stable growth of investment in agriculture and rural areas. Make agriculture and rural areas a priority area for fiscal expenditure, continue to tilt central budget investment toward agriculture and rural areas, and ensure that investment in agriculture and rural areas only increases and does not decrease.

★ Carry out pilot reform of agricultural subsidies, merging the current “three subsidies” (subsidies for improved crop varieties, direct grain subsidies, and comprehensive subsidies for agricultural inputs) into “agricultural support and protection subsidies”, optimizing the direction of subsidy support, and highlighting farmland protection and food security.

Interpretation

On the one hand, the growth rate of national fiscal revenue has slowed markedly; on the other hand, international grain prices remain low. Should investment in agriculture, rural areas, and farmers still be increased? How should the agricultural support and protection system be reformed? This has become a major focus of recent heated discussion from academia to the market.

“In recent years, under conditions of consecutive years of national grain harvests and continuously falling international grain prices, some people believe that the state's support for agriculture can be weakened. But the document proposes that agricultural investment only increase and not decrease, and that agricultural support and protection be further strengthened, reflecting the central government's policy intention not to relax work on agriculture, rural areas, and farmers and to ensure agriculture's position as a top priority.” said Zheng Fengtian, vice dean of the School of Agricultural Economics and Rural Development at Renmin University of China.

The plan clearly proposes establishing a mechanism for stable growth of investment in agriculture and rural areas. Make agriculture and rural areas a priority area for fiscal expenditure, continue to tilt central budget investment toward agriculture and rural areas, and ensure that investment in agriculture and rural areas only increases and does not decrease.

“The document reflects a new concept of shared development in which industry supports agriculture and urban and rural areas develop in coordination.” said Dang Guoying.

The plan also emphasizes optimizing the structure of fiscal expenditures supporting agriculture. In this regard, Zheng Fengtian believes that fiscal support for agriculture indeed has problems such as low efficiency and insufficient precision, and some special funds related to agriculture show characteristics of being “small, scattered, and disorderly”. In the future, fiscal support for agriculture will first tilt toward large grain growers and major production areas, which will also help transform the agricultural development model.

According to Xinhua News Agency