How to advance agricultural industrialization? A summary of countermeasures and suggestions

  1. Formulate a policy system for agricultural industrialization. Use policies to create a social environment, implement a new economic system, and invigorate the industrialization management mechanism. This includes reform of the property rights system, expansion of investment and financing channels, strengthening technological innovation and cooperation, and cultivating core competitiveness, among other things. These are the core driving forces and inherent requirements for developing industrialized management. The main task is to increase support for leading enterprises in agricultural industrialization, especially the cultivation and support of private enterprises, and to clarify in multiple areas such as fiscal policy, financial credit, taxation, land, and agricultural product circulation services the preferential policies that leading enterprises can enjoy.

  2. Cultivate an agricultural industrialization management system. Agricultural industrialization management organizations refer to agricultural enterprises, agricultural product markets, agricultural product industry associations, agricultural cooperatives, and various agricultural intermediary organizations that operate under an integrated production, supply, and marketing model. The agricultural industrialization management system is the main body of agricultural industrialization, including industrialized management organizations, agricultural product production bases, suppliers, and consumers or markets. This is the most basic industrialized management system, namely: "supplier (service provider) + company (industrialized management organization) + base (farmers) + market (consumers)." We should take cultivating leading enterprises as the focus of developing agricultural industrialization management, and building standardized bases as the starting point for developing agricultural industrialization management. Socialized services such as agricultural product information and science and technology have also been gradually established and improved, and online sales have gradually taken shape.

  3. Actively cultivate and improve the market system. Adopt cooperative methods to raise the degree of farmers' organization; break through administrative divisions and boundaries of ownership, industry, and sector, develop various forms of cross-regional and cross-industry collaboration and alliance, guide agriculture-related enterprise entities to adopt the share cooperative method, and form integrated economic cooperative organizations with farmers or farmers' economic organizations; encourage and support the development of various forms of farmers' specialized cooperative economic organizations, and continue to expand the scope of pilot projects. In accordance with the principles of being run by the people, managed by the people, and benefiting the people, actively and steadily develop various forms of agricultural product industry associations, closely combine the transformation of government functions with strengthening the self-development of industry associations, and fully give play to the role of industry associations in industry services, industry self-discipline, and other aspects. Strengthen supervision and management so that various intermediary organizations truly become bridges and ties connecting farmers with leading enterprises and farmers with the market, and raise the degree of farmers' organization. Actively cultivate rural market intermediary organizations, give play to their roles in communicating information, coordinating production, regulating prices, protecting farmers' interests, and protecting agricultural production, and further improve market regulations and the regulatory system to ensure the orderly operation of the market system.

  4. Organize farmers to join a community of economic interests. Agricultural industrialization management is not a simple addition of the pre-production, mid-production, and post-production links of agriculture, but rather the integration of those links into a complete industrial system for integrated management through the establishment by all participating entities of a community of economic interests featuring "shared benefits and shared risks." Whether all participating entities have formed a community of economic interests featuring "shared benefits and shared risks" is an important marker for measuring agricultural industrialization management. By establishing such a community of economic interests, all participating entities connect the pre-production, mid-production, and post-production links of agriculture together in management, with the aim of paying lower transaction costs and obtaining more comparative benefits. Therefore, whether transaction costs can be saved and comparative benefits can be increased, that is, whether the capital appreciation effect of 1+1>2 can be realized, becomes an important prerequisite for whether each economic interest entity participates in the economic community. The economic interest entities participating in agricultural industrialization management mainly include related enterprises and organizations that provide agricultural materials such as machinery, improved seeds, and chemical fertilizers for agricultural production before production; enterprises and organizations engaged in plowing, breeding, sowing, fertilizing, irrigation, harvesting, and pest and disease control during production; and enterprise organizations engaged in the purchase, transportation, processing, and storage of various agricultural products and the sale of agricultural products and their processed products after production. For enterprise organizations participating in the community of economic interests, on the one hand, transaction costs can be reduced, that is, the time, energy, and expenses needed to search for transaction partners, conduct transaction negotiations and sign contracts, determine reasonable prices, and supervise contract performance can be reduced. On the other hand, organizational costs for establishing the community of economic interests and conducting internal management, coordination, and other aspects will also increase.

  5. The choice of "leading" form must suit local conditions and circumstances. The leading units participating in agricultural industrialization management can be processing, storage, transportation, and marketing enterprises, or industry professional associations, specialized cooperative economic organizations, specialized wholesale markets, socialized service organizations, and so on. As for which specific form the leading unit should adopt, on the one hand this requires consideration of the local characteristics of agricultural production and management, and on the other hand it also requires full consideration of the local economic development situation. When selecting and determining a specific leading unit, full consideration must also be given to where its advantages lie. Overall, when selecting and determining a leading unit, consideration should be given to whether a certain form of leading unit or a certain specific leading unit can better attract and drive the broad masses of farmers to connect with the large domestic and international markets at lower cost and with smaller risk. For example, in some areas where state-owned agricultural product processing, storage, transportation, and marketing enterprises have developed relatively well, the "leading" role of local state-owned agricultural product processing, storage, transportation, and marketing enterprises can be brought into play, attracting and organizing farmers operating in a dispersed manner to participate in industrialized management and driving thousands of households as a whole toward the market; in some areas where township and village enterprises engaged in agricultural product processing, storage, transportation, and marketing have developed relatively well, township and village enterprises with certain advantages in agricultural product processing, storage, transportation, and marketing can be taken as the leading enterprises of agricultural industrialization management. Specifically, which form among enterprise organizations such as processing, storage, or transportation and marketing should be taken as the leading unit must also take into account factors such as the development and improvement of the agricultural product market, the degree of specialization and large-scale development of agricultural production, and the varieties of agricultural product production and management. Therefore, the specific form of the leading unit cannot be chosen arbitrarily; it must suit local conditions and circumstances.

  6. The focus of government work should be placed on promoting advances in agricultural science and technology. First, government work must closely center on major technical topics urgently needing solution in agricultural development, concentrate financial, human, and material resources, strengthen basic research, applied research, and high-tech research, and strive to achieve new breakthroughs as soon as possible in key technologies such as agricultural biotechnology, information technology, resource utilization, and ecological protection technology. Extensive international agricultural scientific and technological exchange and cooperation must also be carried out, and the introduction, digestion, absorption, and innovation of technology must be organized in a focused and selective manner. Second, the development and promotion of applied technology must be strengthened, the industrialization process of scientific and technological achievements must be enhanced, and the transformation of scientific and technological achievements into real productive forces must be promoted. To this end, the construction of seedling systems for dried fruits such as walnuts must be accelerated. The agricultural technology promotion system must be consolidated and improved, collaboration among agricultural socialized service organizations must be strengthened, effective forms and ways to accelerate the transformation of agricultural scientific and technological achievements under market economy conditions must be actively explored, and the agricultural technology service mechanism must be innovated and improved. Third, the reform of the agricultural science and technology system must be accelerated, with the focus on solving problems such as departmental segmentation, dispersed strength, and the disconnection between scientific research and production. Scientific research units must be encouraged to innovate, compete, and cooperate, forming a mechanism conducive to producing talent quickly, producing results quickly, and producing major results; agricultural scientific research, education, and promotion units must be encouraged to establish science and technology enterprises and promote the integration of science and technology and education with the economy; enterprises must be encouraged to invest in agricultural scientific research and participate in the transformation and promotion of scientific and technological achievements. At the same time, the technology market must be vigorously cultivated to promote the industrialization and commercialization of agricultural scientific and technological achievements; the organizational system and operating mechanism for the organic combination of "industry, academia, and research" under market economy conditions must be boldly explored. Fourth, the agricultural education system, with higher education as the leader, vocational and technical education as the main body, and coordinated development of education at all levels and of all types, must be improved, and farmers' scientific, technological, and cultural quality must be greatly raised. This is a key point for realizing advances in agricultural science and technology and transforming the agricultural growth model. Because agricultural science and technology ultimately need farmers to master and use them and transform them into real productive forces. If the current situation of farmers' low scientific, technological, and cultural levels is not changed through an effective agricultural education system, then relying on scientific and technological progress to realize the transformation of the agricultural growth model will become an empty phrase, and agricultural industrialization management will also lack a deep foundation.