Why are cotton farmers abandoning cotton? Some plots have been converted to growing trees
Right now is precisely the season for raising cotton seedlings, but, affected by the decline in cotton purchase prices, the enthusiasm of cotton farmers for planting cotton in some of the main cotton-producing areas in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River has generally declined, quite a few cotton fields have been converted to other crops or left fallow, and in some fields trees have even been planted.
In 2014 the cotton market took a sharp dive, with the purchase price of seed cotton falling from more than 4 yuan to 3 yuan, and to this day there is still no sign of a rebound. The sharp drop in cotton-growing returns has directly caused cotton farmers in traditional cotton-growing areas to stop growing cotton.
Xu Conghui, director of the Cotton Office of the Agriculture Bureau of De'an County, Jiangxi Province, told reporters that due to high labor costs and falling cotton prices, cotton farmers are making a loss growing cotton, and it is estimated that the cotton planting area this year will drop by at least 20,000 mu.
Some plots have already been planted with trees
De'an County, Jiangxi Province, as a main cotton-producing area in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River, has a history of growing cotton of more than twenty years. Due to farming techniques and the fixity of the land, farmers generally will not easily switch to other crops, but this year a collective phenomenon of abandoning cotton has appeared.
April is precisely the spring plowing season, and the reporter returned to his own hometown, De'an County, Jiujiang City, Jiangxi Province. At this time in the past, farmers were all busy growing cotton. However, this year the situation is somewhat different.
In the fields and at the field edges of Dafan Village and other places in De'an County, the reporter saw that the number of cotton seedlings farmers are now raising has decreased, some cotton fields have been converted to corn or are being converted to rice, some land has simply been left fallow and is overgrown with grass, and some plots have been planted with landscape tree saplings or fast-growing forest.
The reporter saw that the trees in plots such as Dafan Village and Huangtong Village in Fenglin Town, De'an County, have some already grown to two or three meters tall, having become small groves. The Land Administration Law explicitly states “strictly control the conversion of cultivated land to non-cultivated land”. Against the background of the state protecting cultivated land, planting trees on cultivated land is still a trend worth being vigilant about.
However, some villagers believe that with fewer people growing cotton this year, there will be more fallow land, “leaving it waste is worse than planting some corn or trees, which need no manpower to manage.” In the busy farming season, the reporter saw that agricultural production is not the top priority farmers care about either; what villagers discuss most is where to go to work, including some middle-aged farmers who are all taking odd jobs in the county town.
“Growing cotton now is less and less profitable; casually finding a job in the county town for more than a thousand yuan is better than growing cotton.” said Jin Qirong, a villager from Dafan Village. Last year the couple grew more than ten mu of cotton fields in total and earned only seven or eight thousand yuan, “there is nothing good to grow on the land.” The reporter also confirmed the fact that farmers are abandoning planting from multiple cotton seed sales points. On the seed sales street in De'an County, the reporter learned through investigation that seed shop owners generally complain that seed sales have declined. Song Yan'an, head of Zhongmin Seed Industry Sales Company, said that this year's seed sales are only 1/3 of last year's. The head of the Weinong Seed Sales Office also said that this year's cotton seed sales are only two or three tenths of previous years.
Data from the De'an County Agriculture Bureau show that last year the cotton planting area was 66,000 mu, and the Cotton Office estimates that this year's cotton planting area will probably be only 46,000 mu, with the planting area directly dropping by 20,000 mu, a decline of three tenths.
The phenomenon of cotton farmers abandoning cotton is spreading
In fact, in recent years, the prices of agricultural production materials such as chemical fertilizers, pesticides and labor costs have continued to rise, while the price of cotton, which is directly related to farmers' income, has stagnated, greatly affecting cotton farmers' enthusiasm for growing cotton.
Xu Conghui explained to reporters that before 2014 the state purchased cotton at a protective price, and the cotton price was basically between 4.5 and 5 yuan, and now it has fallen to 3 yuan.
Under the influence of multiple unfavorable factors, farmers ultimately can only vote with their feet and give up growing cotton.
In fact, the phenomenon of cotton farmers abandoning cotton has appeared not only in Jiangxi; it has also appeared in cotton-growing areas such as Hubei and Shandong.
Sun Liwu, a cotton analyst at Sublime China Information, said that after new cotton was concentrated on the market in October 2010, cotton returned to a low-price era, down 27% year on year, and it is expected to hover basically around 13,000 to 14,000 yuan/ton this year, with cotton farmers' seed cotton selling price down 25% to 31% year on year. “The actual returns for cotton farmers are too far behind those for grain and vegetables, and enthusiasm for planting cotton will still decline. It is expected that in 2015 the national cotton planting area will fall to 49 to 50 million mu, down 18% to 19% year on year.”
The decline in cotton planting is also affected by the impact of imported cotton. In the whole of 2014, China imported 2,440,700 tons of cotton, a year-on-year decrease of 1,709,700 tons. China implements a quota system for imported cotton, with cotton within the quota subject to a tariff of only 1%, and if exceeded, a tariff of 40%.
Sun Liwu said in an interview with this newspaper that the cotton price gap at home and abroad is basically flat. Previously it was calculated according to the sliding duty, and this year only 894,000 tons of the 1% quota is issued, but there is still a price gap of about 2,000 yuan/ton between customs clearance at the 1% tariff and cotton circulating domestically.
In Xu Conghui's view, the domestic cotton market price is greatly affected by imported cotton from abroad. The United States has a high degree of mechanization, while Africa has low labor costs; they have their own advantages, while our country has high labor costs. If cotton sells for two yuan a jin, farmers make a loss. Enterprises operate independently and are regulated by the market, so they are willing to use imported cotton.
Starting this year, because imported cotton prices have continued to rise, the state has begun to successively reduce cotton imports. According to customs statistics, in March China imported 127,900 tons of cotton, a decrease of 31,100 tons from the previous month, a reduction of 19.6%.
For cotton farmers, what they care about most is still their own returns. If the returns from growing cotton are less than those from rice, abandoning cotton is also a helpless choice. However, because rice requires water conservancy, and past cotton growing has left canals and reservoirs in disrepair, they can only switch to corn and potatoes, or simply plant trees.
Guo Qihao, director of the De'an County Agriculture Bureau, said that nowadays the autonomy to farm the land is in the hands of ordinary people, and the county agriculture bureau can only provide guidance, such as guiding farmers to grow corn, grow potatoes, or grow mulberry and raise silkworms. If the cotton price remains sluggish, it is impossible to keep growing it forever, and the agricultural structure must be adjusted.