Make farmers' needs the starting point for our work

We must apply innovative thinking, a pragmatic spirit, and a development-oriented perspective, keeping a close eye on farmers' needs and providing them with higher-level and more diverse training

Connecting with farmers' needs is more effective than reward funds. For the government, the money spent is about the same, but the results are very different. Not long ago, a certain place in Zhejiang changed its previous method of providing reward funds to support new types of agricultural business entities to instead rewarding opportunities to go to Taiwan, China, for training. When family farm owners heard about this, they were overjoyed and repeatedly said that the government had considered them thoughtfully. The annual reward funds of 30,000 to 50,000 yuan did play some role in subsidizing production, but going to Taiwan, China, for study and inspection is more useful. They can observe up close and learn the advanced technology and business concepts of Taiwan, China, farms, and after returning they can fully display their talents.

To ensure food security and realize agricultural modernization, the key is to improve farmers' quality and let more new-type professional farmers who are "knowledgeable, technically proficient, good at management, and capable of running a business" operate agriculture. The No. 1 Central Document clearly proposed actively developing agricultural vocational education and vigorously cultivating new-type professional farmers.

How to put farmer training into practice and make farmers feel that it is effective and useful requires relevant departments and local governments to use their brains, apply innovative thinking, a pragmatic spirit, and a development-oriented perspective, keep a close eye on farmers' needs, and provide them with higher-level and more diverse training.

To connect with farmers' needs, we must study farmers' needs in a refined way.

The content of farmer training needs to be expanded. It is certainly no longer enough to teach only technology related to planting and breeding. New types of business entities urgently need training and guidance in agricultural product sales, management, branding, and other aspects. According to a questionnaire survey of more than 1,200 professional farmers by the Chongqing Municipal Agriculture Commission, their needs are mainly concentrated in three aspects: agricultural vocational skills, production management ability, and market development knowledge.

The format of farmer training needs to be improved. It is also not enough to learn knowledge only by sitting in a classroom. Many farmers report that they are more willing to visit and learn from the experience of large-scale operators in other places, to see how large-scale planting is carried out, how new agricultural machinery is repaired, how storage problems are solved, how farms and cooperatives are managed, and so on. Combining field visits with theoretical knowledge brings greater gains.

The level of farmer training needs to be raised. New-type professional farmers need to adapt to new forms of agricultural development. For example, the application of information technology is changing with each passing day. Agricultural product e-commerce, the Internet of Things, intelligent tractors, and unmanned aircraft are all widely used in reality, and the corresponding curriculum system should also be redesigned.

All these things require us to consider them carefully. Training new-type professional farmers is not a small matter, but an important institutional arrangement involving the development of modern agriculture. It requires top-level design at the national level and improvement of the system for cultivating, certifying, and supporting new-type professional farmers and rural practical talents.

The government's guiding and supporting role is indispensable. It should promote the integration of education and training resources, expand the coverage of rural vocational education, and establish a stable long-term guarantee mechanism. At the same time, it should reform the training model and carry out training in agricultural skills and business capabilities around leading industries and farmers' needs. It should also fully give play to the role of the market. For example, leading enterprises in agricultural industrialization, socialized service organizations, and professional training institutions can all play a role.

We must actively guide, effectively supervise, and innovate methods to achieve diversification of farmer training. As long as we use our brains, innovation is everywhere and everything is possible.