A realistic choice for accelerating the development of modern and efficient agriculture

China's rural areas have little arable land per capita, and the human-land conflict is prominent. Developing modern and efficient agriculture tailored to local conditions is of very great significance for optimizing the agricultural industry and product structure, enhancing the competitiveness of China's agricultural products in both international and domestic markets, and increasing farmers' incomes. In recent years, China's efficient agriculture has achieved notable results, but in practice there are still many constraining factors and problems, mainly manifested in: the overall scientific, technological and cultural quality of farmers is relatively low, which does not match the requirements for developing modern and efficient agriculture; the agricultural science and technology R&D system urgently needs improvement, and the agricultural science and technology extension team has few personnel and weak strength, with a low level of service; the degree of specialization, intensification and scale of agricultural production is relatively low; the level of agricultural product processing is relatively low, with less deep processing and low added value; there are few famous and high-quality brands, and their level is not high, so market competitiveness is weak; the development potential of agricultural tourism has not yet been fully tapped, and there are problems such as lax management, low market credibility, a single project type and inadequate service. To accelerate the development of China's modern and efficient agriculture, multiple measures must be taken simultaneously and the above problems must be solved conscientiously.

Strengthen rural cultural education and scientific and technological training, and strive to cultivate a new type of farmer who is educated, understands technology and knows how to run a business. The overall cultural quality of China's rural labor force is relatively low, and as large numbers of young and middle-aged rural laborers with some education transfer to cities and towns and to secondary and tertiary industries, most of those engaged in agricultural production are middle-aged and elderly people with even lower educational levels. This state of labor force quality severely restricts the extension and application of new science and technology in agriculture. To solve this problem, first, we must change the current situation of unbalanced allocation and development of educational resources between urban and rural areas, tilt funding, school facilities, teaching staff and other aspects toward rural areas, develop rural compulsory education well, and comprehensively raise farmers' overall scientific and cultural level; second, we must strengthen training in professional production skills and science and technology for farmers engaged in farming, and provide human resource support for the development of modern and efficient agriculture; third, we must use various forms of education and training to cultivate and improve farmers' market awareness, entrepreneurial awareness and business management ability, and strive to cultivate a group of new-type professional farmers.

Improve the institutional mechanisms for agricultural science and technology R&D and the rural science and technology extension service system. Improve the institutional mechanisms for agricultural science and technology R&D and enhance the capacity for scientific and technological innovation. It is necessary to establish and improve an agricultural-related research organization system and a diversified investment mechanism in which government agricultural research institutions, universities, enterprises, non-governmental organizations and individuals all participate. The government should increase investment in agricultural science and technology and support basic and frontier scientific research in agriculture. Strengthen the construction of key laboratories and variety improvement centers in the agricultural field, improve the facilities, conditions and equipment levels of agricultural research institutions, focus on creating superior varieties with independent intellectual property rights, strengthen integrated scientific and technological innovation in fields such as efficient cultivation, healthy breeding, disease prevention and control, and agricultural water conservation, and raise the contribution rate of science and technology to agricultural production. At the same time, we must adhere to the orientation of agricultural production needs, encourage and support institutions of higher learning and research institutes to carry out various forms of technical cooperation with leading enterprises, agricultural demonstration parks, farmers' professional cooperatives and farming households, promote the organic combination of industry, academia and research and of agriculture, science and education, and accelerate the transformation of agricultural scientific and technological achievements.

Improve the rural science and technology extension service system. First, we must strive to build a team of rural science and technology extension service personnel with high quality and complete coverage of disciplines, adopt preferential policies to encourage college graduates to join the agricultural technology extension service team, improve their working and living conditions, and enable them to take root in rural areas and accomplish something there. Second, we must promote the reform and construction of agricultural technology extension institutions, and establish a diversified agricultural technology extension system led by agricultural technology extension institutions, based on rural cooperative economic organizations, and with the extensive participation and division of labor and cooperation of agricultural science and education units and agriculture-related enterprises. We must focus on building grassroots agricultural technology extension center stations, strive to solve the problem of gaps in grassroots agricultural technology extension institutions, and gradually establish a complete four-level agricultural technology extension service system at the city, county, township (town) and village levels, so as to improve the ability of science and technology to serve agriculture.

Actively promote the specialization, intensification and scaling-up of agricultural production. First, we must actively and steadily promote the specialization of China's agricultural production. First, we must attach importance to the development of traditional specialty agricultural products in various places, and make them strong on the basis of making them specialized and excellent. Second, we must increase the introduction, improvement and testing of famous, excellent, new, rare and specialty varieties, and extend them on the basis of reliable demonstration results. Third, we must fully respect farmers' wishes and choices, and must never forcibly promote them through administrative means. What the government needs to do is mainly to guide, demonstrate, support and provide services in technology, market information and other aspects.

Second, we must actively develop intensive production. Intensive agriculture can be labor-intensive, mainly based on increasing living labor; capital-intensive, mainly based on increasing materialized labor; technology-intensive, mainly based on the intensive adoption of advanced technology; or a combination of the three factors of labor, capital and technology. Whichever type of intensification is used, it can substantially raise the land utilization rate, output rate and labor productivity, and increase the economic benefits of agricultural operations.

Third, on the basis of making agriculture specialized and excellent, we must actively promote moderately scaled operations. China's agricultural production is still currently dominated by small-scale operations by individual households, which not only makes it difficult to achieve an effective connection between small production and the large market, but also cannot generate economies of scale. On the premise of maintaining the stability of existing land contracting relations and keeping them unchanged for a long time, we must invigorate the circulation of land contractual management rights. We must gradually establish and improve a standardized and orderly market for the circulation of land contractual management rights. In accordance with the principles of legality, voluntariness and compensation, farmers are allowed to circulate land contractual management rights in forms such as subcontracting, leasing, exchange, transfer and shareholding cooperation. Through forms such as “company + base + professional cooperative + farming household”, “professional cooperative + farming household”, “large specialized farming and breeding household” and “family farm”, we must promote moderately scaled operation of agricultural land, improve the economies of scale of agriculture, and make efficient agriculture stronger and bigger.

Vigorously develop the agricultural product processing industry and increase the added value of agricultural products. Judging from the ratio of the output value of the agricultural product processing industry to agricultural output value, the average in developed countries is 2.4:1, while in China it is only 1.9:1. This shows that there is a considerable gap between us and developed countries, and there is also great room for future development. We must vigorously cultivate large processing enterprises. First, support existing small and medium-sized enterprises in funding, technology, equipment and other aspects to promote their continuous growth and expansion; second, attract investment to build new large processing enterprises; third, integrate existing enterprises to create a “joint fleet”. In product research and development, we must follow the approach of deep processing, high technology and serialization, cooperate across industries and disciplines to tackle key problems, research and develop new products around both the international and domestic markets, and develop products toward high value-added products such as wine, beverages, health foods and medicines.

Actively promote standardized agricultural production, and accelerate the improvement of the quality and safety level of agricultural products, consumer recognition and market competitiveness. Implementing agricultural production standardization is not only necessary for improving the level of food safety, but also necessary for responding to “technical barriers” in international trade. First, establish and improve as soon as possible a unified and authoritative agricultural standards system that is in line with international practice. On the basis of existing national standards, industry standards and local standards, and with reference to international standards, especially the standards of major destination countries for China's agricultural product exports, formulate and improve China's agricultural standards indicator system, and improve the scientificity, advanced nature and applicability of China's agricultural standards. Second, actively promote the implementation of agricultural standardization. We must standardize agricultural production standards, new technologies and new achievements into technical standards and operating procedures that are easy for farmers to master, actively carry out demonstration and extension work, guide farmers and agricultural production enterprises to organize production according to standards, and establish an agricultural standardization implementation and operation mechanism of “government promotion, multi-department coordination, market pull, enterprise drive, farmer initiative and social participation”. Third, strengthen the construction of an agricultural product quality supervision and testing system. We must establish a joint law enforcement mechanism for agricultural product quality and safety, establish a joint law enforcement team led by the food safety department and participated in by the agricultural administrative department, the industry and commerce management department and the health and quarantine department, exercise whole-process supervision of agricultural product quality and safety from field (processing enterprise) —— market —— dining table, implement an administrative accountability system, and once a problem arises, hold the responsible persons of the regulatory departments at the relevant links accountable. Actively promote the certification of “three products and one label” and the building of famous and high-quality brands. Comprehensively implement routine monitoring of agricultural product quality and safety, market access, quality traceability and information release systems to ensure the quality and safety of agricultural products.

Attach importance to the multifunctionality of agriculture and improve the comprehensive benefits of agriculture. First, vigorously develop ecological agriculture and give play to the ecological benefits of agriculture. We must attach importance to the research and development and transformation of ecological agriculture technology and to summarizing and extending successful ecological agriculture models. In long-term practice, China has created many effective efficient ecological agriculture models, and various places can apply them creatively in light of local conditions. We must learn from the advanced agricultural management methods and agricultural production technologies of developed countries, especially technologies related to agricultural energy conservation, resource protection, resource substitution and environmental restoration, and, combining them with China's existing ecological agriculture theories and technologies, form a complete set of development models and technical systems suited to China's national conditions. Second, do a good job in the agricultural festival economy and tourism and sightseeing agriculture, provide personalized service items for different consumer groups, expand the industrial chain network, strengthen organizational management and training of practitioners, improve service quality, and let more farmers benefit from it.