Grassland Ecological Protection Receives 2 Billion Yuan in Central Government Funding
The reporter learned today from the Ministry of Finance: Recently, the central government, using performance evaluation results as an important basis and taking into comprehensive consideration factors such as grassland area and the state of livestock development, allocated 2 billion yuan in reward funds for grassland ecological protection performance evaluation rewards, to support work in areas including strengthening grassland ecological protection, accelerating the transformation of livestock development methods, and promoting increased income for farmers and herders.
The Ministry of Finance Department of Agriculture stated that, in order to establish and improve incentive and restraint mechanisms, ensure that policies are implemented effectively, and improve the efficiency of fund use, the Ministry of Finance, together with the Ministry of Agriculture, in accordance with the Measures for Performance Evaluation of Central Government Grassland Ecological Protection Subsidy and Reward Funds, and following the principles of objectivity and standardization, unity of rights and responsibilities, and rewarding the advanced, conducted a comprehensive performance evaluation of the implementation of the 2013 grassland ecological protection subsidy and reward mechanism in the relevant provinces and regions, with institutional development, basic work, and implementation results as the three main evaluation contents.
It is reported that since 2011, the central government has arranged special funds to comprehensively establish a grassland ecological protection subsidy and reward mechanism in 8 pastoral provinces and the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps. In 2012, the coverage of the grassland ecological protection subsidy and reward mechanism was further expanded to all pastoral and semi-pastoral areas, implementing policy measures for herders such as grassland grazing prohibition subsidies, grass-livestock balance rewards, improved forage seed subsidies, and herder production material subsidies.