Agriculture says goodbye to the old traditional path, transforms toward modern agriculture
In recent years, China's agricultural and rural development has achieved tremendous accomplishments, but it must also be recognized that the various risks and challenges facing agricultural development are accumulating and converging. Especially after “eleven consecutive years of growth” in grain production, the situation for transforming the agricultural development model has become even more urgent. If the traditional agricultural development model continues to be followed, stabilizing grain production and increasing farmers' incomes will be unsustainable, and sustainable agricultural development will become an empty phrase——
On August 7, the General Office of the State Council issued the "Opinions on Accelerating the Transformation of the Agricultural Development Model," proposing the grand goals of achieving positive progress in transforming the agricultural development model by 2020 and achieving remarkable results by 2030. This is the first important document at the national level to systematically deploy work on transforming the agricultural development model. From stabilizing grain production capacity to innovating business models, from adjusting the agricultural structure to tackling agricultural pollution, numerous policies and measures backed by real money will provide tangible levers for transforming agriculture.
Storing Grain in the Land and Storing Grain in Technology
Enhancing grain production capacity and raising the level of food security safeguards is the primary prerequisite for transforming agriculture. The "Opinions" propose that grain ration production capacity be implemented down to specific fields and plots.
“To achieve this, the core is to shift from focusing on annual output to focusing more on protecting and improving grain production capacity, and to store grain in the land and store grain in technology.” Zeng Yande, director of the Planting Industry Department of the Ministry of Agriculture, analyzed. So-called storing grain in the land means firmly holding the red line for arable land, comprehensively carrying out the designation of permanent basic farmland, and ensuring that the quantity of arable land does not decrease. It means carrying out high-standard farmland construction, focusing on wheat and rice production, giving priority to building 700 million mu of paddy fields and irrigated land into high-standard grain ration fields, and implementing actions to protect and improve arable land quality. So-called storing grain in technology means taking the path of connotative development that relies on scientific and technological progress and increases per-unit yield. It is necessary to continue carrying out research on green yield-increasing models and promote superior varieties and standardized, high-yield, high-efficiency green technology models.
As of now, there are more than 3.41 million farming households nationwide operating more than 50 mu of land, the number of farmer cooperatives registered with industry and commerce nationwide has reached 1.412 million, and the number of family farms exceeds 877,000. To innovate agricultural business models and accelerate the cultivation of new types of entities, the "Opinions" propose studying and reforming the agricultural subsidy system so that subsidy funds are tilted toward grain-growing farmers and new agricultural operating entities such as family farms; and guiding the establishment and improvement of a government-financed agricultural credit guarantee system nationwide.
“New types of operating entities plus agricultural socialized services are the ideal pattern for transforming the agricultural development model.” Li Guoxiang, a researcher at the Rural Development Institute of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, believes that the core of transforming the model is to support various forms of appropriately scaled agricultural operations. On the one hand, farmers should be guided to transfer contracted land in accordance with the law through subcontracting, leasing, exchange, and shareholding; on the other hand, measures such as fiscal support and credit support should be taken to accelerate the cultivation of agricultural operating service organizations and actively promote cooperative, trusteeship, and order-based service forms. In short, it is necessary both to concentrate land resources to form scaled land operations and to use the scaling of services to drive the scaling of production.
⟦NL> Structural Adjustment and Compound Planting
Advancing agricultural structural adjustment and promoting coordinated development of crop farming and livestock raising is an important way to transform the agricultural development model. The "Opinions" propose supporting ecological compound planting adapted to local conditions, scientifically and rationally using arable land resources, and promoting the combination of using and nurturing the land. It is necessary to comprehensively consider the scale of crop farming and livestock raising and the environment's absorption capacity, and actively carry out pilot demonstrations of circular agriculture combining crop farming and livestock raising. It is necessary to promote the integrated development of primary, secondary, and tertiary industries such as raw material production, processing and logistics, and marketing, and promote the retention of more value-added benefits from the industrial chain in the producing areas and with farmers.
In the past, Northeast China had a tradition of grain-soybean rotation, achieving the combination of using and nurturing the land. Zhou Baoku, deputy director of the Soil and Fertilizer Institute of the Heilongjiang Academy of Agricultural Sciences, found through research that in recent years the income per mu from soybeans was less than half that from corn, so grain-soybean rotation decreased substantially. He believes that only using the land without nurturing it has led to increasingly serious problems such as declining soil fertility and worsening pests and diseases, which requires advancing structural adjustment.
Since the beginning of this year, the state has carried out pilot projects for grain-soybean rotation in 30 counties in the Northeast and pilot projects for converting grain to feed in the Three-North region, and the grain-economic structure and crop-livestock structure have been continuously optimized. The Ministry of Agriculture proposed that next year a certain area of corn be reduced in the four northeastern provinces and regions. Industry observers believe this move can both ease the pressure of corn inventories and increase soybean output, while also improving soil fertility. In the future, farmers should be guided by the market to open up the channel for coordinated development of crop farming and livestock raising and form a new agricultural structure that balances grain and feed and combines agriculture and animal husbandry.
At present, there are more than 1.5 million agritainment establishments nationwide, benefiting more than 30 million farmers, and the pace of integration of primary, secondary, and tertiary industries is continuously accelerating. Chongzhou in Sichuan has created a rice-flower sightseeing belt, where people can see rice and beans fragrant in the fields and flowers blooming along the roads, turning production areas into scenic areas. Zhu Xinkai, a professor at Renmin University of China and vice chairman of the Leisure Agriculture Expert Committee of the Ministry of Agriculture, said that it is not enough to do a good job in agricultural product processing; more attention should also be paid to developing the multiple functions of agriculture, freeing agriculture from the single production of primary agricultural products, enabling farmers to share more of the benefits of the entire industrial chain, and keeping more value-added benefits in the local area.
Resource-Conserving and Environmentally Friendly
China has many people but little land and scarce water; per capita arable land area and freshwater resources account for only one-third and one-quarter of the world average, respectively. To solve the problem of feeding the people, methods such as reclaiming wasteland for farming and overgrazing were adopted, leading to excessive pressure on arable land and grasslands and shrinkage of lakes and wetlands. In recent years, industrialization has advanced rapidly, and the damage to the agricultural ecological environment has also been shocking. According to the Second National Soil Environmental Survey, the exceedance rate of major soil pollutant points nationwide reached 16.1%. At the same time, agricultural inputs such as chemical fertilizers, pesticides, and agricultural film are overused, and the utilization rates of byproducts such as livestock and poultry manure and crop straw remain relatively low. Based on this, the "Opinions" emphasize fighting a tough battle in treating agricultural non-point source pollution.
“Looking at the agricultural development trends of developed countries, they all shifted from initially pursuing output as the goal to placing equal emphasis on production development and ecological protection. Today China's agricultural production is also moving in this direction, shifting from the single pursuit of high yields to resource conservation and environmental friendliness, and to saving water, fertilizer, pesticides, and land.” said Qin Fu, a researcher at the Institute of Agricultural Economics and Development of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences.
Facing pressure on agricultural resources and the environment, since the beginning of this year relevant departments have carried out pilot construction for the integrated advancement of specialized unified prevention and control of crop pests and diseases with green prevention and control, and launched an action to achieve zero growth in the use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides. At the same time, they launched pilot projects for comprehensive utilization of livestock and poultry breeding waste and developed rural biogas projects suited to local conditions. They implemented agricultural cleaner production demonstration projects focusing on the recovery and utilization of used plastic film and arranged subsidy funds for dryland farming technologies such as plastic film mulching in Northwest and North China.
The state has successively issued documents such as the National Agricultural Sustainable Development Plan, the Overall Plan for Treating Prominent Agricultural Environmental Problems, and the Implementation Opinions on Fighting the Tough Battle of Agricultural Non-Point Source Pollution Prevention and Control, making comprehensive arrangements for the protection and treatment of the agricultural ecological environment. According to relevant plans, China will achieve “one control, two reductions, three basics” by 2020, namely strictly controlling the total amount of agricultural water use, gradually reducing the total amount of chemical fertilizer and pesticide application, and achieving basically resource-based utilization of livestock and poultry manure, crop straw, and agricultural film.