A new round of rural reform sees three arrows released at once, with three major measures advanced in tandem
For hundreds of millions of farmers, 2015 will be an extraordinary year. From deepening the reform of the rural land system, with a focus on land transfer and the registration and certification of rights, to expanding the pilot rural reform test zones, and then to reforming the rural circulation system with the reform of supply and marketing cooperatives at its core, the new round of rural reform is "releasing three arrows at once" and advancing comprehensively, taking new steps in building a new countryside, achieving new results in increasing farmers' incomes, and adding new momentum to agricultural development.
Land transfer is generally stable and orderly
Land transfer is the focus of rural land system reform and also a hot topic of concern for hundreds of millions of farmers. In April this year, the Ministry of Agriculture, together with the Central Rural Work Leading Group Office, the Ministry of Land and Resources, and the State Administration for Industry and Commerce, jointly issued the Opinions on Strengthening Supervision and Risk Prevention for Industrial and Commercial Capital Leasing Agricultural Land, proposing five systems: upper-limit control, tiered filing, review and verification, risk guarantee funds, and ongoing and ex-post supervision.
"The main purpose of the document is to guide industrial and commercial capital to enter agriculture in an orderly manner, prevent possible problems of non-grain production and non-agricultural use, and ensure that farmers' rights and interests are not harmed, land use is not changed, and comprehensive agricultural production capacity is not damaged," said Zhang Hongyu, director of the Department of Rural Economic Management of the Ministry of Agriculture. With the implementation of the spirit of the document, he said, land management rights transfer across the country is currently generally stable and orderly, policy boundaries are clear and explicit, government guidance and services have been strengthened, and the role of market determination has increased; the enthusiasm of social capital to participate in transfer is still rising, and awareness of rational choice and standardized operation has increased.
The latest data show that the degree of standardization of land transfer has increased, with the signing rate of transfer contracts accounting for about two-thirds; moderate-scale operations continue to develop, with 3.41 million farming households operating more than 50 mu, and an operated cultivated land area of more than 350 million mu, accounting for one quarter of the area under household cultivated land contracting contracts; the land management rights transfer market continues to develop, with land transfer service centers established in 1,324 counties (districts and cities) and 17,300 townships across the country; transfer disputes have been effectively mediated, with rural land contracting arbitration committees established in 2,411 counties (districts and cities), mediating 91,700 land transfer disputes, accounting for 36.1% of the total number of land contracting and operation disputes.
If land transfer is the foundation of scale operation, then land rights confirmation and registration is the foundation of the foundation. On the basis of last year's province-wide pilots in 3 provinces including Shandong, Sichuan, and Anhui, this year 9 more provinces including Jiangsu, Jiangxi, and Hubei were selected to expand province-wide pilots, while other provinces expanded county-based overall pilots in light of local conditions. As of the end of March, 2,065 counties (districts and cities) across the country had carried out pilots, involving 15,000 townships and 240,000 villages, accounting for 73%, 42%, and 40% of the counties, townships, and villages where pilots should be carried out, respectively. A measured cultivated land area of 290 million mu had been completed, and a rights-confirmed area of 220 million mu.
Gaoching County in Shandong Province adopted village-specific policies and has smoothly completed the task of rights confirmation, registration, and certification in 700 villages. In Zhengmiao Village, Changjia Town, in the county, the reporter saw villager Li Youming's land contracting and operation rights certificate: 4.62 mu of contracted land, scattered across 5 plots, with the name, code, measured area of each plot and the names and coordinate positions of adjacent plots clearly marked. In the rights confirmation and registration materials filed at the town economic management station, there were not only his signed and confirmed household head representative declaration, confirmation statement, and public announcement no-objection statement, but also public announcement photos, copies of the household head's ID card and household register, and so on.
⟦NL> The reporter learned that land rights confirmation and registration did not increase farmers' burdens. Funding for rights confirmation, registration, and certification work is borne by finance departments at all levels, and no fees are charged to farmers. According to reports, this year the Ministry of Agriculture, together with the Ministry of Finance, formulated the Measures for the Management of Subsidy Funds from the Central Government for the Confirmation, Registration, and Certification of Rural Land Contracting and Operation Rights, clarifying the subsidy recipients, methods, standards, and time limits for the central government's special transfer payment funds. As of the end of May, the central government's 2015 special subsidy funds of 4.58 billion yuan had all been allocated to provincial-level finance departments.
Rural reform test zones play a demonstration role
In November last year, the Ministry of Agriculture and 13 other departments jointly approved the second batch of rural reform test zones and test tasks, designating 34 areas including Tongzhou District in Beijing as the second batch of rural reform test zones, which, together with 9 first-batch rural reform test zones including Yutian County in Hebei Province, respectively undertake 14 reform test tasks. At present, the number of rural reform test zones under the new situation has reached 58, and the test content covers all major areas of rural reform.
"Rural reform test zones are a comprehensive platform for the central government to advance rural reform pilot tests, in order to concentrate forces, achieve breakthroughs in key areas, crucial links, and institutional mechanisms, and form reform experience that can be replicated and promoted," said Zhang Tianzuo, director of the Department of Policies and Laws of the Ministry of Agriculture. In the process of exploratory testing, he said, the test zones have based themselves on local realities, continuously improved institutional design, achieved notable results in explorations in some areas, and some practices have already played a demonstration role.
In establishing a modern rural financial system, relevant test zones have focused on supporting agricultural and rural development, striving to solve current rural problems such as difficulty in financing, difficulty in obtaining guarantees, weak financial services, insufficient total financial supply, and a poor credit environment, and the level of financial services for "agriculture, rural areas, and farmers" has been notably enhanced.
Chengdu City in Sichuan Province innovated a third-party mechanism for collecting ex-field vegetable prices and explored vegetable price index insurance, an innovative agricultural insurance tool. Liao Bing, a major vegetable grower in Banzhu Village, Longquanyi District, in the city, was among the first to insure with vegetable price index insurance. Liao Bing said that previous agricultural insurance only compensated for natural disaster losses and did not cover price fluctuations. The Chengdu Municipal Finance Bureau and the Municipal Agriculture Commission jointly promoted the pilot of vegetable price index insurance, agreeing on an ex-field price for each vegetable as the insured price. When the actual ex-field price is lower than the insured price, it is deemed an accident, the insurance company intervenes to assess the loss, and this gave participating vegetable farmers peace of mind.
In the reform of the rural property rights system, relevant test zones have actively explored effective forms of realizing the collective economy, created conditions to broaden channels for farmers' property income, advanced reform of the rural collective property rights system in multiple forms, and carried out fruitful explorations in establishing property rights trading markets and carrying out shareholding reform of collective economic organizations. Dingyuan County in Anhui Province innovated the management and protection mechanism for farmland water conservancy projects, established 6 township water conservancy and fishery technical service center stations, and built a four-level grassroots water conservancy convenience service system with center station water conservancy staff, village-level water managers, and water user association members as the main body, and with county water conservancy departments, township center stations, village water managers, farmers, and water user associations participating.
"Agriculture, rural areas, and farmers" expert Zhu Xinkai, a professor at Renmin University of China, conducted follow-up research on multiple test zones. He told the reporter that rural collective property rights reform should be carried out in accordance with the requirements of a modern property rights system and based on actual conditions. From actual conditions, different forms and paths of developing share cooperatives should be explored. For operating assets, the focus is to clarify the ownership of collective property rights, convert assets into shares and quantify them to members of collective economic organizations, and explore the development of farmers' share cooperatives. For non-operating assets, the focus is to explore effective mechanisms for unified collective operation and management, so as to better provide public-benefit services to members of collective economic organizations.
Rural circulation reform gets on the fast track of the Internet
Not long ago, the unsalable 5 million kg of green onions in Qian County, Shaanxi Province, attracted people's attention. "Previously, green onions could sell for as much as 2 yuan per kg, but now no one wants them even at more than 0.1 yuan!" Looking at bundles of green onions at home, the villagers were as anxious as ants on a hot pan. This drew the attention of the Shaanxi Provincial Supply and Marketing Cooperative, which quickly organized more than 40 "vegetable express vehicles" to head to the area. After consultation, the supply and marketing cooperative finally purchased the green onions at 0.6 yuan per kg, set up temporary direct-sales stores for green onions, and at the same time carried out combined online and offline sales through online sales channels. Soon the high-quality, low-priced green onions were snapped up.
The circulation link connects social production and consumption, and circulation efficiency bears on farmers' vital interests. Many rural areas in our country have inconvenient transportation, and circulation difficulties have become a bottleneck restricting the sale of agricultural products. At the same time, business entities providing socialized services in the rural circulation field are generally scattered, and their service functions are relatively weak, so a systematic and appropriately scaled economic organization needs to be cultivated in rural areas to assume responsibilities. In today's flourishing Internet era, the traditional offline circulation method based mainly on supermarkets and warehousing can no longer fully meet market needs. All of this means that the rural circulation system faces tremendous change.
The state has always attached great importance to reform of the rural circulation system. This year's No. 1 Central Document especially mentioned the need to innovate agricultural product circulation methods and proposed supporting e-commerce, logistics, commerce, finance, and other enterprises in participating in the construction of agriculture-related e-commerce platforms. This pointed out the direction for the reform of our country's rural circulation system. In April this year, the Decision on Deepening the Comprehensive Reform of Supply and Marketing Cooperatives issued by the State Council proposed strengthening the construction of the supply and marketing cooperative agricultural product circulation network, innovating circulation methods, and promoting various forms of production-sales linkage. In line with the new trend of profound changes in business models and consumption patterns, it called for accelerating the development of supply and marketing cooperative e-commerce, forming integrated operations of online transactions, warehousing and logistics, and terminal distribution, and realizing integrated online and offline development.
The reporter learned that the All China Federation of Supply and Marketing Cooperatives has more than 300,000 comprehensive service agencies and more than 1 million business service outlets, and is the main force in our country's agricultural circulation field. According to Zou Tianjing, vice chairman of the All China Federation of Supply and Marketing Cooperatives, within the third quarter of this year, the supply and marketing cooperatives will launch a nationwide e-commerce platform, integrate the system's offline physical resources as quickly as possible, and transform the numerical advantage of outlets into the systemic advantage of a network.
Promoting reform of the rural circulation system and accelerating the development of rural e-commerce require the joint efforts of multiple departments. According to Kong Lingyu, deputy director of the Market System Construction Department of the Ministry of Commerce, the Ministry of Commerce will, together with the Ministry of Finance, proactively adapt to the development trend of Internet informatization, promote the development of new e-commerce models in rural areas, and use the Internet to rebuild and upgrade the "Ten Thousand Villages and Thousand Townships" program. At the same time, it will continue to carry out comprehensive demonstration work for e-commerce entering rural areas. In 2015, fiscal funds reached 2 billion yuan, and the scope of support expanded to the central and western regions and the east, involving a total of 200 counties (districts and cities).