How can modern agriculture accelerate its development? Institutional innovation is the key
In recent years, driven by the deepening of rural reform, Sichuan Province has vigorously cultivated diversified agricultural operating entities, built a new type of agricultural operating system, and continuously pushed forward the accelerated development of modern agriculture. At present, the province has 7 national-level modern agriculture demonstration zones, 9 national-level agricultural industrialization demonstration bases, 800 modern agriculture demonstration zones of ten thousand mu and one hundred million yuan, 60 counties designated for cultivation as strong counties in modern agricultural industry bases, 60 key counties for modern agriculture construction, 60 strong counties for modern forestry industry cultivation, and 46 key counties for modern animal husbandry.
Focus on policy innovation to cultivate diversified operating entities for modern agriculture. Highlight various forms of cooperation and association, and support the development and growth of farmers' cooperatives. The province has successively issued a series of opinions on advancing the accelerated development of modern agriculture, increasing policy support in registration, finance, banking, projects, land use, electricity use, and talent cultivation, advancing pilot projects for fiscal support of cooperatives, guiding the development of federations of farmers' professional cooperatives, and promoting the vigorous development of farmers' cooperatives. Up to now, the province has 38,117 registered farmers' professional cooperatives, with a total of 679,300 actual members and total capital contributions of 76.679 billion yuan.
Highlight moderately scaled operations and support the development of specialized large households and family farms. Carry out family farm registration on a voluntary basis and actively create demonstrative family farms. Establish special support funds for family farms, and support the development of family farms through direct subsidies, awards in lieu of subsidies, loan interest subsidies, and other means. Encourage agriculture-related financial institutions to develop loan products suited to the production and operation characteristics of family farms, improve loan methods, and further raise the credit limits for credit loans to family farms. At present, the province has 6,267 family farms.
Highlight encouraging and guiding industrial and commercial capital to develop in rural areas, and actively develop mixed-ownership leading enterprises in agricultural industrialization. The province issued the "Opinions on Supporting the Development of Leading Enterprises in Agricultural Industrialization and Vigorously Promoting the 'Two Drives'." Vigorously implement the "vanguard" project for leading enterprises in agricultural industrialization, cultivate enterprise groups, expand the Sichuan Tea Alliance, build a hundred-billion industry, and change the situation of "tens of thousands of households growing tea, thousands of enterprises and tens of thousands of factories processing tea, and thousands of brands and tens of thousands of products selling tea." At present, the province has more than 8,500 leading enterprises of various types in agricultural industrialization, including 60 national-level leading enterprises and 589 provincial-level leading enterprises.
Highlight innovation in the agricultural socialized service system. Carry out the creation of demonstration counties for agricultural socialized services, innovate service models, actively promote services such as the combination of technology and materials, technical contracting, and full-process trusteeship, actively develop technologies such as agricultural product e-commerce and the agricultural Internet of Things, improve the "12316" benefit-farmers service platform, integrate agriculture-related website resources, and enhance the level of agricultural informatization services.
Focus on scientific and technological innovation to strengthen the scientific and technological support for developing modern agriculture. Improve the scientific and technological innovation capacity of agricultural research institutes. By piloting the equityization of scientific and technological achievements, encourage scientific and technological personnel to go to rural areas to innovate and start businesses, play the role of "reaching the sky" and "standing on the ground," write papers on the land, and leave achievements in farmers' homes. Carefully organize the "Ten Thousand Agricultural Science and Technology Personnel Enter Ten Thousand Villages and Ten Thousand Households" activity, and establish a scientific research management system that is scientific, standardized, efficient, and consistent with the modern institute system. Actively advance the construction of national agricultural science and technology parks in Ya'an, Guang'an, Leshan, and other places, as well as the construction of more than 90 provincial-level agricultural science and technology parks. At present, the province has 4 national-level agricultural science and technology parks, ranking first in the western region.
Focus on promoting the deep integration of science and technology commissioners with the "three rural issues" and leading enterprises, and enhance the supporting capacity of science and technology for the agricultural industry and rural economy. Encourage leading enterprises to increase research investment and improve independent innovation capacity. Support leading enterprises in digesting, absorbing, and mastering major key technologies and core processes in the industry, and carry out integrated innovation. Innovate the talent cultivation mechanism. Accelerate the cultivation of a large number of modern enterprise management talents who are familiar with "three rural issues" policies, master modern business concepts, and have strong ability to serve farming households. The province has dispatched 17,000 science and technology commissioners, established 133 provincial-level science and technology commissioner teams such as those for high grain yields, and science and technology commissioners have established 1,480 rural economic cooperation organizations, implemented a total of 2,980 science and technology development projects, with an annual output value reaching 1.29 billion yuan.
Focus on innovation in the investment mechanism to enhance the staying power of modern agricultural development. Innovate the mechanism for integrating fiscal funds. According to the principles of "channels unchanged, purposes unchanged, coordinated arrangements, concentrated investment, each performing its own duties, and forming joint forces," integrate and optimize various types of fiscal agriculture-supporting funds across the province, such as comprehensive agricultural development, agricultural technology promotion, agricultural infrastructure construction, rural public welfare facility construction, and fiscal poverty alleviation and development, use them in a coordinated manner, form a working mechanism of departmental coordination, cooperation, and positive interaction, and focus support on a number of key modern agricultural development projects, including the new grain production capacity construction project, the modern agriculture hundred-billion demonstration project, the high-standard farmland construction project, the rural energy construction project, the modern crop seed industry improvement project, the agricultural mechanization demonstration project, the agricultural product quality and safety system construction, and the construction of township or regional public welfare agricultural technology promotion systems.
Innovate financial support methods. Implement the credit loan system for farmers' cooperatives, increase the credit rating and limits of demonstration cooperatives, and strive to meet the loan needs of farmers' cooperatives in carrying out production and operations. Actively cultivate new rural financial organizations in accordance with the law, focusing on the development of new rural financial service institutions such as village and township banks, loan companies, and rural mutual fund cooperatives. Improve differentiated credit policies for agriculture-related banks. Carry out various pilot innovations in mortgage loans for rural property rights, and encourage financial institutions to actively develop new credit businesses such as mortgages on large agricultural machinery, pledges of movable property, and pledges of warehouse receipts and accounts receivable. Accelerate innovation in agriculture-related loan guarantee methods, physical mortgage methods, and fund disbursement and settlement methods, explore the establishment of a common fund for the development of farmers' cooperatives, and build a financing guarantee platform for farmers' cooperatives. Establish a mechanism of complementary policies and shared risks between insurance companies and agriculture-related financial institutions. Advance agricultural openness and cooperation and agricultural investment attraction. Use platforms such as the Western China International Fair and the Sichuan-Taiwan Agricultural Cooperation Forum to attract external investment and increase social capital investment in agriculture and rural construction.