Rural Land Reform Lifts Farmers' Dream of Prosperity

Contiguous plantings of sugar oranges, fruit and vegetable greenhouses standing in neat rows, organic rice forming a “green dam”…… In Xiangzhou County, Guangxi, a national pilot county for rural land verification and registration, along with the rollout of reform work such as land verification, rural land transfer and large-scale operation have clearly accelerated. Some farmers have become “bosses”, while others, while collecting land rent, have transformed into “industrial workers”, realizing their “dream of prosperity” right at their doorstep and driving the great development of modern agriculture.

A “migrant worker girl” becomes a “boss” at her doorstep; the cooperative leader is the “first to eat crab”

She uses an iPhone 5S, speaks fluent Mandarin, and the villagers mostly call her “Boss Qin”. Qin Xiukui, 39, of Fengyang Village, Zhongping Town, Xiangzhou County, despite having only a junior high school education, did not want to work away from home long-term. In 2008 she quit her job at a garment factory in Guangdong and returned home, seized the opportunity of the new round of rural land verification, and leased 80 mu of land in one go to plant sugar oranges.

After Xiangzhou County became a national pilot county for rural land verification and registration in 2012, it first selected 2 villages in Zhongping Town for early trials, and in 2013 advanced the pilot across the whole township of Baizhang Township; currently all 11 townships in the county have fully launched the pilot work. With land verified and people reassured, large-scale land transfer has begun.

In March 2014, Qin Xiukui contracted 80 mu of farmland from more than 60 households of villagers on a 12-year lease, with an annual rent of 700 yuan per mu. Qin Xiukui did the math for the reporter: 80 mu of sugar oranges produce 100,000 kg of oranges a year, at 12 yuan per kg; after deducting about 10,000 yuan per mu for labor, fertilizer and other investment, the total annual income is more than 400,000 yuan.

It is not an isolated case. Xiangzhou Town also has cooperative “bosses”. At the production demonstration area of the Xiangzhou County Lufengyuan Agricultural Products Planting and Circulation Cooperative, the reporter saw that modern agricultural technologies such as plant growth lights and “integrated water and fertilizer” are basically used here. In the greenhouses, watermelons and Hami melons are blooming in competition, and workers are busy pollinating; in the greenhouse next to it, workers are picking tomatoes and cucumbers, loading them onto carts and taking them to cold storage, with plans to sell them to the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao region.

This is a cooperative created through land transfer. The cooperative leader is 31-year-old young farmer Huang Xiaolong. In 2012, Huang Xiaolong mortgaged his property for a loan and contracted land to set up the Lufengyuan vegetable planting and circulation base. “At the beginning, almost no villagers thought contracting land to run a base would work.” Huang Xiaolong said. Relying on land transfer, the cooperative now has 1,100 mu of land.

The “Lufengyuan” brand gradually gained fame and holds a certain market share in Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Hong Kong and other places. In 2014 it was awarded “National Demonstration Cooperative of Farmers' Cooperatives” by nine ministries and commissions including the Ministry of Agriculture. Liao Bingchun, deputy director of the Xiangzhou County Agriculture Bureau, said that with the new round of rural land reform, developing modern agriculture in the form of cooperatives has great prospects, and the county currently has 160 farmers' professional cooperatives.

“Landless” farmers collect land rent; some become “industrial workers”

Huang Yanzhi, a villager of Fengyang Village, transferred her family's 4 mu of land to Qin Xiukui. “In the past, growing rice earned only three or four hundred yuan per mu per year; now, contracted out, it brings 700 yuan per mu every year regardless of drought or flood.” said 64-year-old Huang Yanzhi.

While farmers like Qin Xiukui realized their “boss dream” at their doorstep, “landless” farmers like Huang Yanzhi realized their “dream of prosperity” by collecting land rent. Qin Xiukui's planting base hires 5 villagers on a regular basis every day, and during the busy farming season as many as 30 villagers come to work at the base each day.

Tan Yanjiao, a 59-year-old villager of Fengyang Village, comes to work at Qin Xiukui's sugar orange base after finishing the farm work at home. Weeding and fertilizing pay 80 yuan a day, and there is basically something to do every day. She said: “Now that I'm older, I can't go out to work, but finding a job nearby is handy and adds a considerable income to the family.”

The cooperative run by Huang Xiaolong also attracts a large number of farmers to come and work. At present, there are more than 60 “regular workers” coming to work, and at most more than 80 villagers come to do odd jobs. “If we get rich, everyone should get rich; one person getting rich means nothing.” Huang Xiaolong said.

In Huang Xiaolong's cooperative production demonstration area, Qin Guiping is pollinating Hami melons. She said that working at the cooperative earns 2,000 yuan a month, about the same as working in Guangdong in the previous two years, and she can also take care of her family.

Since 2013, Baizhang Township has promoted the transfer of more than 8,000 mu of land, accounting for more than 40% of the township's paddy field area. Township head Qin Fuwen said that Guangxi Zhuangliang Agriculture and Animal Husbandry Co., Ltd., introduced last year, used 2,800 mu of transferred paddy fields to plant organic rice in a concentrated way, and the company then contracted it out in sections to local farmers for production management; farmers can obtain rent of 720 yuan/mu per year and management wage income of more than 1,000 yuan/mu per year. At the same time, if the organic rice managed by farmers reaches the specified yield or more per mu, they can also get dividend commissions.

“High-end” agricultural products emerge as the times require; the “de-agriculturalization” tendency must be prevented

In Baizhang Township, Xiangzhou County, many villagers talk about a kind of organic rice that is very “high-end”, selling for 60 yuan per kg.

The reporter saw lush, contiguous plantings of organic rice in Shangfu Village and Xiafu Village of Baizhang Township. After land verification, a large number of paddy fields in Baizhang Township were transferred to organic rice planting companies and planted with organic rice free of pesticide residues and heavy metal pollution.

Wei Fuhua, director of Shangfu Village in Baizhang Township, said: “On TV they say that in many places the post-70s generation is unwilling to farm and the post-80s generation does not know how to farm; here it is very different, and many young and middle-aged people who went out to work have returned home to rush to plant organic rice.”

Zhou Guibin, a villager of Bohou Village in Baizhang Township, transferred more than 2 mu of paddy fields to the Baizhang Township organic rice planting base. In addition to collecting 720 yuan per mu per year in rent, he also manages 70 mu of organic rice for the boss. “Managing rice can earn 70,000 yuan a year in management fees.” Zhou Guibin said.

Zhao Dezheng, deputy general manager of Xiangzhou Honghua Organic Rice Co., Ltd., told the reporter that farmers only take care of planting, while sales and brand building are the company's business; at present the company's organic rice is mainly sold to Guangdong, Shanghai and other places, and there is still room for price growth.

Huang Shuncheng, secretary of the Party Committee of Baizhang Township, said: “Of the 8,000 mu of land already transferred in Baizhang Township, 6,000 mu is used for planting organic rice, and we will strive to achieve full coverage of 20,000 mu within two years.”

Liang Chao, member of the Standing Committee of the Xiangzhou County Party Committee and deputy county head, said that at present the county's land transfer area is 117,000 mu, accounting for 11% of the county's cultivated land area. With the advancement of the new round of rural reform, the main players in farming in the future will be large growers, farmers' cooperatives, family farms and modern agricultural enterprises. “However, after transfer, the land needs to guard against the ‘de-agriculturalization’ tendency.”