One article to understand the three current questions on farmland protection in our country
June 25 is National Land Day. Ensuring the balance between farmland occupied and reclaimed, promoting orderly land transfer, and steadily carrying out pilot rural land reform are the core of our country's current land issues, the three major challenges facing our country's farmland protection, and issues that the whole society should value and think about.
1. Factories and reservoirs "turned into farmland": How much do you know about the "imbalance" of the balance between occupied and reclaimed land
⟦NL> On a piece of reclaimed farmland, supporting farmland water conservancy facilities such as stone steps and canals are relatively complete, and it looks like a standard farmland plot. But the crops are growing very poorly, and the potatoes, scallions, taro, and potatoes are all wilting. Villagers told reporters that although this reclaimed farmland has well-built roads, canals, and ditches and meets the standards for restoration to cultivation, in reality it has no water source and is simply not suitable for farming. This is what reporters recently discovered during an interview in a certain place in Chongqing. Chongqing's work on the balance between occupied and reclaimed land is considered exemplary nationwide, and construction land must always be reclaimed before it is occupied. However, "occupying superior land and compensating with inferior land" is still unavoidable.
Public information shows that the downward trend in our country's farmland, especially high-quality farmland, has not diminished. According to verification by Zhao Ye, a professor at the School of Environment of Beijing Normal University, from 1997 to 2010, non-agricultural construction occupied 27.465 million mu of farmland, equivalent to half the territory of Hainan Province, and most of it was high-quality farmland.
To make up for the gap in land occupied by construction, our country requires a balance between occupied and reclaimed land: "however much is occupied, that much must be reclaimed." This policy generally helps ensure our country's farmland retention. However, most newly added farmland only "looks beautiful." Liu Kang, a researcher at the Land Research Institute of the China Land Surveying and Planning Institute, found through investigation that in many provinces farmland resources are becoming scarcer and the balance between occupied and reclaimed land is becoming more and more difficult, resulting in occupying paddy fields and compensating with dry land, and occupying superior land and compensating with inferior land. Surveys show that about half of the farmland occupied each year in our country is paddy field, while less than 20 percent of the compensation is paddy field.
"According to national standards, the farmland reclamation fee for one mu of paddy field in Baoting County is about 4,000 yuan. If land consolidation is used to achieve equally high-quality paddy field, it costs about 20,000 to 30,000 yuan, and the difference must be advanced by the county-level finance." said Wu Xiong, director of the Baoting County Land and Resources Bureau in Hainan Province. Only when national and provincial governments increase fiscal support can local governments afford the compensation.
According to the 2015 No. 1 National Land Supervision Announcement, routine supervision of 56 cities found that in 47 cities, 1,215 projects failed to supplement farmland according to the required quantity and quality or failed to pay farmland reclamation fees as required, involving an area of 153,000 mu; 45 cities identified land currently consisting of housing, factories, reservoir water surfaces, etc. as farmland, involving an area of 107,400 mu.
"More than 80 percent of the supervised cities showed the phenomenon of using construction land to supplement farmland, which is a typical case of passing off inferior goods as good and occupying superior land while compensating with inferior land. It can be seen that the balance between occupied and reclaimed land policy is severely distorted." said Li Guoxiang, a researcher at the Rural Development Institute of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
2. Fertile farmland "turned into grassland": How much do you know about the "loss" of land transfer
Alfalfa has a well-developed root system, is drought-tolerant, and has strong nitrogen-fixing capacity. It can loosen the soil and increase soil organic matter. Research statistics from the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences show that planting alfalfa can improve medium- and low-yield fields, increasing grain output by 20 kilograms per mu, and medium-yield fields by 10 kilograms of grain. The strange phenomenon is that central provinces and regions "plant forage grass on fertile farmland."
"Unlike other areas of China, where alfalfa is planted on poor land, sandy land, and hillside land, we use fertile farmland transferred from farmers to plant alfalfa, which gives good quality and high yield." a grass industry company publicly claimed online.
In a county in northern Anhui, the largest land transfer project is alfalfa planting, with a transfer scale of 100,000 mu, supplying grass for the local introduction of dairy cattle farming. Reporters saw that large tracts of farmland originally planted with wheat and corn were planted with green alfalfa, just like a grassland and quite spectacular. Local officials said they wanted to "build an inland prairie."
It is not an isolated case. In another major agricultural county in Anhui, the vast majority of transferred land is used to grow flowers and nursery stock. Hu Chenglin, a professor at Anhui Agricultural University, believes that when industrial and commercial capital goes to the countryside, land transfer becomes land loss, and the "non-grain" trend is worrying. "At present, there are only principled provisions on the use of transferred land, such as not changing the agricultural use of farmland. But there is a lack of detailed rules on how to control the proportion of grain and cash crops. The rate of return from growing grain is certainly lower than from growing cash crops. In the long run, there are hidden dangers for food security."
Han Changfu, Minister of Agriculture, said that to transform traditional agriculture and develop modern agriculture, it is necessary for industrial and commercial capital to enter agriculture, and it is also encouraged and welcomed. But when industrial and commercial enterprises enter agriculture, they should mainly provide services before, during, and after production and develop modern breeding and planting industries suitable for enterprise-based operation, leaving ordinary breeding and planting links to farmers. They do not necessarily all need to directly lease large areas of farmers' contracted land, and in particular they must not touch the bottom line of "non-agriculturalization" of land. "When bosses go to the countryside, they should drive the villagers along, not replace them."
3. "Buying up" villages: How much do you know about "absolutely must not be changed" in agricultural land reform
In a certain county in central China, starting in 2014, the owner of a private enterprise engaged in agricultural planting began implementing a major plan throughout the county: spending money to purchase villagers' long-neglected old homes. The entrepreneur told reporters that two villages' homes have already been purchased, and in the future all village homes in the county with relatively good natural environments and his planting bases will be bought up.
Under current laws and regulations, not to mention that urban residents cannot purchase farmers' homesteads, even residents of neighboring villages cannot purchase homesteads across villages. In the 33 pilot rural land reform areas approved by the central government, the provisions remain effective.
"At this stage, pilot administrative regions must not use withdrawal from homestead use rights as a condition for settling in cities. Homestead withdrawal shall be voluntary and compensated, and transfer shall be limited to within the same collective economic organization, to prevent urban people from going to rural areas to buy land and build houses, leading to 'counter-urbanization.'" Jiang Daming, Minister of Land and Resources, said when reporting to the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress on risk prevention and control in the 33 reform pilots.
Urban land is state-owned, and suburban and rural land is collectively owned. This is stipulated by the Constitution and is the bottom line of reform in accordance with the Constitution. The entrepreneur who wants to buy up village homes throughout the county said that after renovation, these villages will form an "agricultural eco-tourism industry chain" linked to planting bases. Urban residents can lease and plant in the bases through membership, and the company hires people to take charge of planting. Urban members come on vacation every year and stay in the village homes purchased by the company to "experience the joy of rural life." He said he signed purchase agreements with farmers household by household, and the local government supports it. "Moving farmers out of old homes both improves farmers' lives and revitalizes farmers' idle assets, achieving two goals at once."
"Land system reform is an important part of comprehensively deepening reform, and it is also one of the difficult points of reform. It involves major interest adjustments, relevant legal amendments, and the improvement of a series of important systems such as the rural collective economic organization system and the villagers' self-governance system." Jiang Daming said that we must adhere to the bottom lines of not changing the public ownership nature of land, not breaching the farmland red line, and not harming farmers' interests.
Reporters saw during interviews that much capital entering rural areas is engaged in large-scale agricultural operations. But "land enclosers" are not few. A person in charge of an agricultural enterprise in Huainan, Anhui, said that many of his friends in real estate or commerce are chanting the "rural land contracting scripture": "Enter now, land rent costs are low and there are subsidies. In the future, once this land appreciates, we will earn even more."
An operator who formerly engaged in fertilizer marketing admitted frankly that he had already gone to the countryside and contracted more than 600 mu of land. "Trading time for space": the contract period is 20 years, and by the time it expires farmers will long since have stopped farming and left their hometowns. He himself will become "one of China's first batch of farm owners."
"We must take a clear stand against proposals to change the public ownership nature of land; we must investigate and punish according to law and hold accountable with severe penalties acts that use the name of reform to occupy farmland; and we must promptly stop and resolutely correct situations in reform that harm rural rights and interests." Jiang Daming said.
Protect precious farmland
Hurry up and do something
June 25 this year is the 25th National Land Day. The basic national condition of many people and little land, and the major matter of feeding more than a billion people, determine that farmland is our country's most precious resource. Farmland must be protected well, and there must not be the slightest mishap.
All things grow from the soil, and where there is land there is grain. Ensuring that the farmland red line is not touched and ensuring absolute food ration security are major matters concerning the safety of the state. Implementing the strictest farmland protection policy and ensuring the red line of 1.8 billion mu of farmland: central policies, national regulations, and the statutory responsibilities of governments at all levels are already extremely clear. However, analyzing the situation from all sides, the situation facing our country's farmland protection is extremely severe.
In terms of quantity, data from the Second National Land Survey show that compared with the First Land Survey, national construction land increased from 29.18 million hectares to 35 million hectares (525 million mu). More than 500 million mu of construction land is an astonishing scale. Although it has guaranteed the land demand for economic and social development in our country's rapid urbanization and industrialization process, the data also show that the problems of idle and wasted land, extensive use, and low efficiency are deeply entrenched. In 2014, a special land supervision on economical and intensive land use found that across the country, more than 13 million mu of approved but unsupplied land and 1.05 million mu of idle land existed. Idling on one side while expropriating on the other has reached a point where it can no longer continue, and we can no longer remain indifferent.
In terms of quality, our country's farmland "internal injury" is that high-quality farmland is disappearing at an even faster rate. From the First National Land Survey to the Second National Land Survey, in 13 years the paddy field area lost in just the five southeastern coastal provinces was equivalent to the entire paddy field area of Fujian Province. The Second National Land Survey had a cutoff at the end of 2009. The situation in the following 6 years can hardly be said to have improved. In terms of climate and other environmental resources, the shift from "sending grain from the south to the north" to "sending grain from the north to the south" also reflects changes in farmland quality behind it. Occupying paddy fields and compensating with dry land, and occupying superior land and compensating with inferior land, exist not only within some provinces, autonomous regions, and municipalities, but also at the national level. We can no longer let this go unchecked.
"The city encircling the countryside" has become a trend of swallowing everything. "To protect farmland, we must hurry up and do something" -- one wonders how many people this thought has drifted through the minds of. "June 25" is a statutory commemoration day, a day to awaken concern about land. I hope we can join hands and use practical actions to safeguard the security of the state and push farmland protection work to unfold more solidly.