China's farmers store about 500 billion jin of grain in stages every year.

A reporter recently went to rural areas of Pingdu County, Shandong, for interviews, and everywhere could see farmers drying grain on roads, with vehicles passing back and forth along roads covered with grain, leaving clouds of dust in their wake.

Local farmers told the reporter that rural drying areas are now lacking, so they have no choice but to dry newly harvested grain on roads. After the grain is dried, they either sell it directly or put it in plastic woven bags and store it in simple granaries at home, causing huge losses every year.

Farming households are the main body of grain production and operation, and also the main body of grain storage. About 500 billion jin of grain is stored in stages in the hands of farming households in China every year. However, due to poor storage conditions, backward technical levels, crude grain storage containers, and lack of knowledge of scientific grain storage, the grain loss rate caused by household grain storage is about 8%, and annual grain storage losses amount to as much as 40 billion jin, accounting for more than half of the year's total grain losses. Improving household grain storage conditions is not only conducive to reducing household grain storage losses, but also conducive to ensuring national food security and food safety.

Grain losses reduced

To reduce post-harvest grain losses, the first measure is to change the way farming households store grain. Since 2007, China has carried out a project for scientific grain storage by farming households, distributing new-type grain storage containers to farming households. So far, 8.17 million sets of new-type grain storage containers have been allocated to 26 provinces across the country, reducing the average grain storage loss rate of benefiting farming households by 6%, and reducing grain storage losses for these farming households by 900,000 tons every year.

In Dawangjiazhai Village, Sanzhuang Town, Donggang District, Rizhao City, Shandong, many farmers have installed colored steel plate grain storage bins at home. Villager Wang Jundong told the reporter that previously his family mainly put grain in discarded woven bags or cement vats, and sometimes the loss from 100 jin of grain reached 10 jin. Since installing scientific grain storage bins, the grain has basically suffered no losses.

However, China has a huge number of farming households. There are 210 million grain-growing farming households nationwide, and fewer than 3% of farming households have implemented the special project for scientific grain storage by farming households. Post-harvest drying, sorting and storage losses remain very large, and reducing household grain storage losses remains a long and arduous task.

Granaries urgently need upgrading

During interviews in various places, the reporter learned that with the development of large-scale land management and the rise of farmers' cooperatives, family farms, and large specialized grain-growing households, their grain storage scale is growing larger and larger. Every grain harvest season, because they lack good grain storage facilities, they also face considerable grain storage losses. Some family farm owners, in order to reduce post-harvest grain losses, have no choice but to sell grain when the price falls as new grain is concentrated on the market, seriously affecting grain-growing returns.

Ding Shengli of the Eighth Work Station of the First Management District of Beidahuang Stock 854 Agricultural Branch planted 4,500 mu of rice this year. Due to good climatic conditions, output increased by nearly 27% over last year. This year the government minimum purchase price for rice reached 1.55 yuan per jin, but because Heilongjiang's minimum purchase price purchase has not yet started, Ding Shengli had no choice but to sell all the rice that had no granary storage at 1.46 yuan per jin, with a net income of more than 4 million yuan. If he had grain storage facilities to store grain and waited to sell when rice prices rose, his grain-growing returns would be better.

Ding Shengli said he had long wanted to build a granary with drying equipment and a storage capacity of 2,500 tons, which would require at least more than 2 million yuan in investment, but because of a lack of funds he had delayed starting construction. In another two or three years, he definitely wants to build a granary of his own. This can not only maximize grain-growing efficiency, but also reduce the pressure on national grain storage.

Zhou Yanwu, owner of the Dalan Family Farm in Halaha Village, Zhuchengzi Town, Dehui City, Jilin Province, planted 4,000 mu of corn this year. Although it suffered severe drought, because low-lying land increased output, production still reached more than 4 million jin, and returns were higher than last year. He now stores corn in scientific grain storage bins and in a simple grain storage bin he built himself with wooden poles and wire, and plans to sell it before or after the New Year.

Zhou Yanwu said the current scientific grain storage bins have small capacity and cannot satisfy large grain-growing households like them. He hopes to build a granary with drying equipment, but it would cost several hundred thousand yuan. He hopes the state can develop large scientific grain storage bins for large grain-growing households like them.

Support policies clear

At present, family farm owners or large specialized grain-growing households like Zhou Yanwu generally face the difficult problem of grain storage. Building a grain storage facility with drying equipment costs at least 300,000 to 400,000 yuan, or as much as several million yuan, which many family farm owners and large grain-growing households cannot afford. This requires the state to increase support, provide them with the needed funds, technology and services, encourage them to improve the scientific and technical level of grain storage, and reduce post-harvest losses.

The state has now made it clear that it encourages and supports farmers' cooperatives, family farms, specialized large households and other new-type agricultural operation entities to build grain storage facilities. For large grain-growing households, this is undoubtedly something worth looking forward to.

A relevant person in charge of the National Food Administration clearly stated that in the future it is necessary to expand the scope of implementation of the project for scientific grain storage by farming households, increase training for farmers in advanced grain storage technology, and at the same time, in light of the characteristics of large grain-growing households and family farms, develop and research new large grain storage containers, help large grain-growing households reduce grain storage losses, and ensure national food security.