Brand agriculture advances more steadily, and solidifying the foundation is key

Along with the accelerated advancement of modern agriculture, many local governments have already placed brand building at the strategic level for consideration. At the end of 2014, the Ministry of Agriculture released the "Research Report on the Brand Development of Chinese Agricultural Products," which put forward a systematic discussion on the development of brand agriculture and the institutional development of agricultural brands. The building of agricultural branding is a systematic project that requires top-level design and overall planning of the whole situation, and even more requires starting from multiple subdivided areas such as the certification system, the quality and safety system, and the supervision system to provide solid foundational support for brand agriculture building.

Establish a scientific and effective certification system. In recent years, requirements for the quality and safety of agricultural products have shifted from requiring the final product to be qualified to requiring the planting and breeding stages to be standardized, safe, and reliable, actively advocating and promoting "from farm to table" whole-process control of agricultural product quality and safety, which in turn gave rise to production management and control systems and corresponding system certification. At present, due to the lack of standardized and normalized operation and management, the product quality of many agricultural products in China is difficult to effectively guarantee, and brand building thereby loses its foundational support. In recent years, the "three products and one label" certification system, GAP Good Agricultural Practices, and GVP Good Veterinary Practices have been continuously improved, and the level of agricultural product production management and quality and safety has been comprehensively raised. Strict certification standards and strengthened post-certification supervision can enable branded products to play a demonstrative and leading role in process control, reduced-input production, and ecological environmental protection.

Comprehensively raise the level of agricultural standardization. Agricultural standardization is an important foundation and an important symbol of developing modern agriculture, and it is also a basic condition for agricultural brand building. Standardization promotes brand development, and brands drive standardization building. In 2014, agricultural departments at all levels increased their efforts in agricultural standardization work, established the concept of branding, and, centering on the goal of developing, cultivating, and creating branded agricultural products, treated the advancement of agricultural standardization as a basic task, guiding producers and operators to develop and cultivate more pollution-free agricultural products, green food, and organic food, and cultivating a number of agricultural standardization demonstration projects with local characteristics.

Accelerate the establishment of a traceability system for agricultural product quality. In 2014, the Agricultural Product Quality and Safety Center of the Ministry of Agriculture added a Traceability Management Division, vigorously advancing the building of a traceability system for agricultural product quality and safety, concentrating efforts on building a unified national traceability information platform, actively carrying out traceability pilots, vigorously advancing origin exit management and market access management for agricultural products, and gradually achieving standardization and institutionalization, transforming management work from passive response to routine management and source management. In 2014, the Ministry of Agriculture issued the "Guiding Opinions on Accelerating the Building of a Credit System for Agricultural Product Quality and Safety," requiring that, with agricultural input enterprises and agricultural product production enterprises, farmers' cooperatives, and large planting and breeding households as the focus, a mechanism of incentives for keeping trust and punishment for breaking trust be established, comprehensively raising the awareness of integrity and the credit level for agricultural product quality and safety, and basically completing the building of a credit system for agricultural product quality and safety through five years of effort. Comprehensively advancing the building of the traceability system and the credit system for agricultural product quality is conducive to transforming the agricultural development model and improving the quality of agricultural development, laying a solid foundation for brand building.

Improve the quality supervision system for agricultural products. Strengthening the supervision of agricultural product quality and safety is conducive to raising the sense of responsibility, integrity, and self-discipline of agricultural production and operation entities, to giving play to the regulatory role of the market, and to enhancing the effectiveness of agricultural product quality and safety supervision. The main tasks of national agricultural product quality and safety supervision work are to "eliminate hidden dangers and ensure safety, control the source and raise the level, improve the system and strengthen capacity, and perfect the institutions and build mechanisms." Controlling the source and raising the level means starting from production, vigorously advancing standardization demonstration creation, strengthening quality control in the production process, and continuously raising the level of agricultural product quality and safety; improving the system and strengthening capacity means strengthening institutional team building, strengthening the guarantee of conditions for law enforcement supervision, and comprehensively enhancing supervision capacity; perfecting the institutions and building mechanisms means continuously summarizing successful experience and practices, forming systems and models, promoting them nationwide, and forming a long-term supervision mechanism that combines incentives and constraints. Over the past year, agricultural administrative management departments at all levels strengthened the building and management of the agricultural product quality inspection system, continuously improved the public service capacity of agricultural departments, performed the duty of supervising agricultural product quality and safety in accordance with the law, and safeguarded the safety of the agricultural industry and the safety of agricultural product consumption.

The 2014 Central Rural Work Conference proposed that, on the basis of stabilizing grain production, agricultural structural adjustment should be actively advanced, relying on scientific and technological support, and shifting from "production orientation" to "consumption orientation." In an era of diversified consumption, Chinese agriculture must implement a brand strategy, raise the quality level and market competitiveness of agricultural products, satisfy continuously upgrading consumer demand, and guide the emergence of healthy and safe consumption, thereby forming brand competitiveness. Only when high-quality agricultural brands enter consumers' hearts can agriculture gain greater space for survival and development.