How cultivated land is concentrated toward large grain-growing households and other operating entities

International experience shows that a country's focus of attention and policy goals regarding food security will be continuously adjusted along with changes in its own economic development and the international environment.

The Central Rural Work Conference held in December 2013 proposed implementing a national food security strategy based on self-reliance, domestic footing, ensuring production capacity, moderate imports, and technological support, so as to ensure basic self-sufficiency in grains and absolute security of staple food rations. This is a guideline proposed by the central government by drawing on international experience and adapting to the new situation and new requirements of domestic resource and environmental conditions, the grain supply and demand pattern, and changes in the international trade environment.

We can see that developed countries generally do not have prominent problems of food quantity or supply security; their focus of attention regarding food security is mainly food price stability and food security for the poor population. For them, more emphasis is placed on the nutrition of food and price stability. In countries where per capita agricultural production resources are scarce, apart from implementing a high degree of protection for key agricultural products in domestic consumption (such as rice and potatoes) to maintain a relatively high self-sufficiency rate, for other agricultural products they pay more attention to providing sufficient and diverse food supplies for their residents through international trade.

Two important relationships and four key tasks

To build and implement a national food security strategy under the new situation, China must handle two important relationships well: first, while attaching importance to food quantity, pay more attention to quality and quality safety; second, while ensuring current supply, pay more attention to sustainable agricultural development.

Of course, it is also necessary to focus on doing a good job in four key tasks:

First, strictly guard the red line for cultivated land protection. Uphold the red line of 1.8 billion mu of cultivated land, further improve the policy of balancing cultivated land occupation and compensation, and ensure that the total amount of basic farmland does not decrease, its use does not change, and its quality does not decline.

Second, mobilize and protect the enthusiasm of farmers in main producing areas for growing grain and the enthusiasm of governments in main producing areas for promoting grain production. Let farmers find grain growing profitable, and let main producing areas gain tangible benefits from promoting grain production.

Third, clarify the responsibilities of the central and local governments.

Fourth, attach great importance to saving grain. The astonishing reality of waste requires saving grain, with emphasis on solving the problem of grain waste in the processes of collection and storage, sales, and processing, so as to form a good trend of saving grain.

How to ensure food security

So how can food security be ensured?

First, enhance the comprehensive grain production capacity. China's agricultural labor productivity and land output rate still have much room for improvement, and the main way to tap the potential is to develop various forms of agricultural scale operations. In advancing land scale operations, attention should be paid to moderation and orderliness, so as to achieve simultaneous growth in labor productivity and land output rate.

⟦NL> The government's main responsibility, on the one hand, is to improve the policy for granting urban resident status to the agricultural migrant population, promote the transfer, employment, and settlement of rural labor, and create conditions for scale operations; on the other hand, it is to improve the rural land property rights system, develop the rural land market, and guide cultivated land to concentrate toward large grain-growing households, family farms, specialized cooperatives, and other new types of operating entities. To improve agricultural production efficiency, it is necessary to continuously advance agricultural technological progress and improve the basic conditions for grain production.

Second, enhance the capacity for sustainable development. The practice of pursuing increased grain output without regard to environmental costs should be changed, and the agricultural ecological environment should be effectively protected. Scientific and rigorous planting standards for heavy metal contaminated land should be formulated, and for areas with serious pollution that truly need to withdraw from grain cultivation, a reasonable ecological compensation mechanism should be established to ensure that farmers' employment and income are not affected. A special subsidy system for land quality protection should be implemented, and rewards and subsidies should be given to farmers who voluntarily leave land fallow, adjust their structures, or limit the use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides.

Third, improve the quality and level of cultivated land. Expand the scope of implementation of projects such as soil testing and formulated fertilization and soil organic matter improvement pilot programs. Vigorously promote conservation tillage techniques, implement reasonable crop rotation and intercropping and relay intercropping, and reduce damage to the soil layer from agricultural tillage. Encourage and guide farmers to adopt soil improvement techniques such as returning straw to the field, planting green manure, and increasing the application of organic fertilizer, so as to raise soil organic matter content. With main grain producing areas as the focus, carry out comprehensive management of water, soil, fields, forests, and roads, intensify the transformation of medium- and low-yield fields, and increase the proportion of stable and high-yield farmland.

Fourth, strengthen the construction of farmland water conservancy infrastructure and improve the management and protection mechanism for farmland water conservancy construction. It is necessary to deepen the reform of the management system of water conservancy projects and accelerate the implementation of fiscal subsidy policies for the operation and maintenance funds of irrigation and drainage projects. Through methods such as rewarding instead of subsidizing and subsidizing after construction, explore new mechanisms for capital farmland water conservancy construction.

Fifth, strengthen agricultural scientific research breakthroughs and technology extension. With molecular breeding as the focus, strengthen basic research and biotechnology development; with the agricultural Internet of Things and precision equipment as the focus, build a technical system for full-process informatization and mechanization of agriculture. Establish a breeding innovation system with enterprises as the main body, promote the flow of seed industry talent, resources, and technology to enterprises, and cultivate and promote a number of breakthrough new varieties that are high-yield, high-quality, stress-resistant, and suitable for mechanized production. Strengthen the construction of rural grassroots public welfare service systems, support the development of service organizations such as farmers' cooperatives, professional service companies, professional technical associations, farmer brokers, and agriculture-related enterprises, give play to the role of commercial service organizations, and provide low-cost, convenient, and all-round services for farmers engaged in grain production and operation activities.

Sixth, improve the grain price formation mechanism and market regulation system. The state launches target prices and lets market supply and demand determine grain prices. The No. 1 Central Document of 2014 required launching a pilot program for target price subsidies for soybeans in Northeast China and Inner Mongolia. Comprehensively use means such as reserve releases and purchases and import and export regulation to ensure basic stability of domestic grain market supply. Improve the management system of central reserve grain and encourage eligible diverse market entities to participate in policy-based grain purchasing and storage.

In addition, international resources and the grain market should be used rationally. Study and formulate an international trade strategy, strengthen guidance for import planning, optimize the layout of import sources, and establish stable and reliable grain trade relations. Strengthen entry-exit plant inspection and quarantine, crack down on grain smuggling, and ensure the quality and safety of imported grain and the security of domestic industries. Accelerate the implementation of the agricultural going global strategy and cultivate large internationally competitive enterprises in grain and oil and other fields. Explore the establishment of an international agricultural trade fund and an overseas agricultural development fund.

Seventh, strengthen support policies for grain production development. Continue to implement policies such as direct subsidies to grain-growing farmers, improved seed subsidies, agricultural machinery subsidies, and comprehensive agricultural input subsidies, with new subsidies tilted toward important agricultural products such as grain, new types of agricultural operating entities, and main producing areas. In places where conditions permit, carry out pilot programs to subsidize producers according to actual grain sown area or output, and improve the precision and targeting of subsidies. Establish a benefit compensation mechanism. Improve the benefit compensation mechanism for main grain producing areas and support local governments in carrying out cultivated land protection compensation. Increase fiscal transfer payments to main grain producing areas, increase reward subsidies to major commodity grain producing provinces and major grain producing counties, and encourage main sales areas to invest in and build grain production bases in main producing areas through various means and undertake the task of completing national grain reserves. Increase insurance support. Raise the proportion of premium subsidies from central and provincial finances for insurance on major grain crops.