Li Keqiang says China is willing to share agricultural technology with developing countries
ROME, Oct. 15 (China News Service) -- Chinese Premier Li Keqiang delivered a speech titled "Advancing Agricultural Modernization Through Family Farming" on Oct. 15 local time at the headquarters of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization in Rome. Li Keqiang pointed out that we are willing to join hands with countries around the world to create a world free of hunger and poverty with sustainable development.
Li Keqiang said that this year's World Food Day theme is “Family Farming: Feeding the World, Caring for the Earth.” Relying on family farming to solve the problem of feeding people also suits China's actual conditions. China's reform and opening up more than 30 years ago began in the countryside. Through reforms such as the introduction of the household contract management system, developing family farming successfully solved the people's problem of food and clothing, helped hundreds of millions of people escape poverty, and met the UN Millennium Development Goals ahead of schedule.
Li Keqiang pointed out that for China's agricultural production to reach a new level, it must appropriately expand scaled operations and take the path of agricultural modernization. We will uphold the fundamental role of family farming in agriculture and promote innovation in various forms of agricultural operation. We will protect farmers' land rights and interests, respect farmers' wishes, and encourage eligible farming households to transfer land management rights.
⟦NL> Li Keqiang stressed that the Chinese government attaches great importance to agriculture, insists on basically achieving food self-sufficiency based on domestic production, and attaches great importance to the sustainable development of agriculture. China has solved the food problem for nearly 20% of the world's population with arable land and freshwater resources below the world average. We will continue to use agricultural resources intensively and efficiently, further strengthen ecological protection and development, and both meet the needs of the present generation and leave fertile farmland and clear waters and blue skies for future generations.
Li Keqiang said that everyone having food to eat is humanity's most basic right to survival and the foundation of all human rights. Promoting agricultural development and eliminating hunger and poverty are major challenges facing the world and the common responsibility of all humanity. The international community should join hands to strengthen agricultural cooperation, reduce trade protection, and pay more attention to and help developing countries, especially the least developed countries. China is willing to share agricultural technology, agricultural equipment and agricultural development models without reservation with all countries, especially developing countries. In the next 5 years, the Chinese government will donate 50 million US dollars to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization for South-South cooperation in agriculture, and will increase support for the World Food Programme and the International Fund for Agricultural Development.
Li Keqiang finally said that as the world's largest developing country, China is a positive force for safeguarding world food security. We are willing to join hands with countries around the world to create a world free of hunger and poverty with sustainable development.
FAO Director-General Graziano warmly welcomed Li Keqiang's visit to FAO headquarters in his address and thanked China for its strong support for the FAO. He said that China is a defender of food security, a promoter of the world's poverty reduction cause, and a front-runner in achieving the UN Millennium Development Goals. He believed that China's agriculture will certainly achieve greater accomplishments and make greater contributions to world food security.
Senior officials from the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, the World Food Programme, the International Fund for Agricultural Development and other institutions, representatives of countries permanently accredited to UN agricultural agencies, and delegates attending the 41st session of the Committee on World Food Security, more than 600 people in total, attended the event. They responded to Li Keqiang's speech with prolonged warm applause. (End
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