Land transfer pilot program has reached 300 million mu, rural reform fires three arrows at once
Agricultural product price reform, rural land system reform, and rural collective asset property rights reform have entered deep water, marking a comprehensive acceleration of a new round of agricultural and rural reform——
Although it is still deep winter, the spring tide of the rural land system reform pilot has already surged. Along with the introduction of the pilot opinions on the three reforms of the rural land system, agricultural product price reform, rural land system reform, and rural collective asset property rights reform have formed a trend of “three arrows fired at once,” marking a comprehensive acceleration of a new round of agricultural and rural reform. In this round of rural reform, in the process of accelerating the breaking down of the urban-rural dual structure, clear property rights are being defined and rights are being returned and empowered for the main carriers of farmers' rights, such as agricultural products, the “three plots of land,” and rural collective assets. This will lay a solid foundation for safeguarding farmers' rights and interests, innovating the agricultural operation system, and advancing agricultural modernization.
Price reform shows greater respect for the market
Agricultural product price reform is still in an acceleration period of a long-distance race. The state is focusing on promoting the gradual transformation of the minimum purchase price and temporary storage policies into a target price policy for agricultural products
Since January this year, the state has liberalized the purchase price of tobacco leaves. Because tobacco leaves are the last variety in the agricultural product field to be subject to government pricing, the industry believes this marks the complete exit of government pricing of agricultural products from the stage of history, but it does not mean that agricultural product price reform has been completed. In fact, agricultural product price reform is still in an acceleration period of a long-distance race. The state is focusing on promoting the gradual transformation of the minimum purchase price and temporary storage policies into a target price policy for agricultural products, implementing a separation of “price” and “subsidy.”
In recent years, the minimum purchase price and temporary storage policies have played a key role in mobilizing farmers' enthusiasm for growing grain and strengthening the state's ability to regulate grain. However, under the new situation in which domestic agricultural product prices continue to exceed those abroad, the original policies face severe challenges. “The price formation mechanism for agricultural products is distorted, and the role of the market has not been effectively brought into play.” said Cheng Guoqiang, a researcher at the Development Research Center of the State Council. The minimum purchase price and temporary storage policies have strengthened the expectation that grain prices will “only rise and not fall,” and to a certain extent have given the market a “policy market” tendency. In particular, cotton and sugar have already formed the unfavorable situation of “domestic production increases, the state increases reserves, imports increase, and the state increases reserves again.” It is precisely against this background that the central government has made agricultural product price reform an important task of agricultural and rural reform.
For the sake of prudence, China is advancing target price reform by variety and by region, carrying out early trials on soybeans and cotton. Last year the state officially canceled the temporary storage policies for cotton and soybeans, launched pilot target price subsidies for cotton in Xinjiang and soybeans in Northeast China and Inner Mongolia, and explored pilot target price insurance for agricultural products such as grain and live pigs. The target price is determined according to production costs plus basic returns, and does not intervene in the market price.
Taking cotton as an example, its target price in 2014 was 19,800 yuan per ton, and the temporary storage policy that had been implemented for 3 years came to an end. Relevant officials of the National Development and Reform Commission believe that this price can compensate for the cotton production costs in the pilot areas and ensure that farmers obtain basic returns. At present, the state is carrying out pilot reforms of target price subsidies for cotton and soybeans, has established a regulatory contingency plan for live pigs to alleviate cyclical fluctuations in market prices, and through comprehensive measures such as establishing a reserve system for important agricultural products and improving the import and export adjustment mechanism for agricultural products, has prevented large fluctuations in the prices of major agricultural products and protected farmers' interests.
Land reform focuses on returning rights and empowering
In response to problems such as the excessively broad scope of land expropriation and the imperfect guarantee mechanism for farmers whose land is expropriated, it is necessary to explore and improve a land expropriation system with standardized procedures, reasonable compensation, and diverse safeguards
From land rights confirmation to land transfer, from market entry of commercial construction land to reform of the homestead system, the breadth and depth of rural land system reform are unprecedented.
Last year, China selected Shandong, Sichuan, and Anhui provinces to carry out province-wide pilots for the confirmation, registration, and certification of land contractual management rights, while other provinces selected whole counties to carry out pilots. At present, 1,611 counties (cities) have carried out pilots, involving 300 million mu of cultivated land. The Ministry of Agriculture stated that this year, China's pilots for the confirmation, registration, and certification of land contractual management rights will be further expanded, with another 8 to 10 provinces selected to carry out province-wide pilots, and each prefecture-level city in other provinces selecting 1 county to carry out a county-wide pilot, with coverage reaching 500 million mu.
Rights confirmation is the first step, and guiding land transfer is the focus. At present, land transfer is showing a trend of accelerated development. The area of cultivated land under household contracted management transferred nationwide is 380 million mu, with a transfer ratio of 28.8%. There are more than 2.87 million specialized large households with operating areas of more than 50 mu, and more than 870,000 family farms.
At present, the nationwide area of rural collective commercial construction land is about 42 million mu, and the total area of homestead land is about 170 million mu. Previous land systems placed more emphasis on the resource attributes of agricultural land and paid insufficient attention to asset attributes. The transfer of homestead land was strictly restricted, and the proportion of value-added gains from construction land obtained by farming households was too small. At present, under central government permission, some regions are carrying out early trials of reform of rural collective commercial construction land and have achieved certain results. Chongqing, Sichuan, and other places have carried out pilots for the transfer of rural collective construction land, exploring the reasonable distribution of value-added gains among the state, the collective, and individuals.
A few days ago, the central government issued policy documents concerning rural land expropriation, market entry of collective commercial construction land, and the homestead system. Jiang Daming, Minister of Land and Resources, explained that in response to problems such as the excessively broad scope of land expropriation and the imperfect guarantee mechanism for farmers whose land is expropriated, it is necessary to explore and improve a land expropriation system with standardized procedures, reasonable compensation, and diverse safeguards; in response to problems such as the incomplete rights and capacities of rural collective commercial construction land and its inability to enter the market on equal terms, it is necessary to establish a market entry system for rural collective commercial construction land with equal rights and equal prices, smooth transfer, and shared returns; in response to problems such as difficulties for farming households in obtaining homestead land and unsmooth exit, it is necessary to improve a homestead system with fair acquisition according to law, economical and intensive use, and voluntary paid exit.
Asset reform focuses on clarifying property rights
For operational assets, the focus is to clarify the ownership of collective property rights, convert assets into shares and quantify them to members of the collective economic organization, and explore the development of farmers' share cooperation
Just after New Year's Day, villagers in Tongjiaqiao Village, Shapingba District, Chongqing, who received dividend funds were overjoyed. The one villager who received the most got nearly 16,000 yuan in dividends. He said, “The village collective economy has grown and strengthened, and we all have dividends at the end of the year.” At present, the village's 4 villager groups have completed the 2014 year-end dividends for the village and groups, distributing a total of 8.76 million yuan, an increase of 1.46 million yuan over the previous year, benefiting more than 2,300 villagers and shareholder residents.
Tongjiaqiao Village is a typical urban village, and the village collective income mainly relies on renting out factory buildings, storefronts, and sites. After years of accumulation, the village has formed considerable collective assets, and the annual village collective income has reached 11 million yuan. In recent years, the village has carried out a shareholding system reform of collective assets, making villagers into shareholders and clarifying asset ownership by quantifying shares to individuals.
With the development of the rural economy, village collective income in many places has grown relatively quickly, and villagers are paying increasing attention to financial disclosure and how collective returns are distributed. Experts believe that after shareholding reform, everyone who was once registered as a village resident can enjoy corresponding equity rights to collective assets according to the length of time they lived in the village. “After the shareholding reform, more villagers care about collective development.” This is the feeling of Li Dazhi, former village Party secretary of Gonghe Village, Longpo District, Chongqing. Gonghe Village established a collective asset supervision committee, composed of 21 representatives including representatives of those who transferred from agricultural to non-agricultural status, responsible for auditing major matters such as the distribution of returns from village collective assets.
“The pilot reform of rural collective asset property rights will take into account the different regions of the east, central, and west, and select a number of qualified counties (cities) as units to carry it out. The pilot work will be completed by the end of 2017.” said Chen Xiaohua, Vice Minister of Agriculture. It is necessary, in accordance with the requirements of a modern property rights system and proceeding from reality, to carry out reform of the rural collective property rights share cooperation system. For operational assets, the focus is to clarify the ownership of collective property rights, convert assets into shares and quantify them to members of the collective economic organization, and explore the development of farmers' share cooperation. For non-operational assets, the focus is to explore an effective mechanism for unified collective operation and management, so as to better provide public welfare services to members of the collective economic organization and community residents.