Why is the grain issue not a simple matter of addition and subtraction?

On December 8, the National Bureau of Statistics announced this year's grain output at 616.239 million tons. Although this was 5.201 million tons less than in 2015, it was still a bumper harvest year. At the same time, a certain voice has emerged in society again, essentially continuing the doubts of previous years, saying "How come there's another bumper harvest? Constant bumper harvests aren't a good thing either," "It wastes both money and land," and so on.

To sum up, this comes down to no more than three reasons. First, the belief that grain production is piled up with money. Over the years, funding for the "four subsidies" has kept increasing, and with the minimum purchase price policy for rice and wheat and the temporary storage price for corn, rising output has added to the fiscal burden. Second, the belief that there is too much grain and nowhere to store it. On the one hand, old grain has not yet been disposed of; on the other hand, new grain has been harvested, yet storage capacity has not increased by much. In peacetime, the state has no need to store so much grain either. Third, the belief that foreign grain is both better in quality and cheaper in price, so it is better to import than to produce it ourselves. Importing grain is equivalent to importing land and water.

So what is the truth? First, are agricultural subsidies really excessive? Compared with developed countries, our country's agricultural subsidies still lag considerably. Data show that the average level of agricultural subsidies in OECD countries is 21.7%, with South Korea at 52.1%, Japan at 47.3%, and the European Union at 25.33%, far higher than our country's level of 9.1%, while 40% of American farmers' income comes from agricultural subsidies. Second, on the storage issue. Objectively speaking, as grain has been harvested abundantly year after year, our country's storage capacity has indeed shown itself to be inadequate, and there is no small shortfall in warehouse capacity. On the one hand, there are reasons related to the reserve system; on the other hand, it is because in the past every peasant household kept large vats for storing grain, whereas now most no longer store any, and combined with factors such as the price inversion, this has led to increased inventories. But one cannot negate strategy because of technical problems, cannot negate the long term because of a temporary problem, and even less can one negate the significance of a bumper grain harvest because of insufficient warehouse capacity. Third, is it realistic to pin the problem of feeding ourselves on others? History has long proven time and again that when one's rice bowl is held in someone else's hands, it is neither steady nor full. General Secretary Xi Jinping has pointed out many times that "we must remember history, and on the issue of food we must not suffer amnesia, and must not forget the pain once the wound has healed." Moreover, the room for adjustment in the international market is limited; it is neither enough for us to eat nor possible for it all to be sold to us.

The grain issue is not a simple matter of addition and subtraction. First, "the five grains and food rice are what the people depend on for their lives." Grain is first of all a public good, the most basic element for production, life and survival in human society. The nature of grain determines that it is not an ordinary commodity and cannot be handled entirely according to market laws. Second, the grain issue is both an economic issue and a political issue, the "stabilizing anchor" of national development. Grain prices are the foundation of all prices and are tied to price stability. Especially against the backdrop of increased downward pressure on our country's economy over the past two years, its role as a "ballast stone" has become even more evident. Third, the grain issue cannot withstand upheaval. History has repeatedly shown that a sharp fall in grain output is easy, but recovery is very difficult. Once a major problem occurs, it will leave one passive for many years. For example, in the mid-1990s, our country had bumper grain harvests year after year and relaxed somewhat on grain production, which resulted in a sharp reduction in output from 1998 to 2003, and it took 5 years to recover to the level of ten years earlier. Nowadays, as the total population, the proportion of urban population and consumption levels rise, grain demand can only increase and cannot decrease, making it all the more necessary to correctly understand the foundational position of grain.

"Take agriculture as the ultimate way." The grain issue is not simply a matter of more or less, not purely an issue of agriculture itself, and not an issue of farmers alone. Precisely when the agricultural situation is good, one must all the more not be negligent and relax grain production. Of course, how to make a good thing even better still requires the great wisdom of the government and relevant departments.

What is most gratifying is that this wisdom has already been clearly reflected in this year's grain production. From the National Bureau of Statistics' interpretation of the 2016 grain production situation, this year's bumper grain harvest was achieved on the basis of all localities taking the initiative to optimize the agricultural production structure and regional layout. Against the backdrop of the structural reform of the agricultural supply side, appropriately reducing the corn planting area in non-advantageous regions and adopting measures such as "replacing corn with soybeans" and "replacing grain with feed" made grain production better fit market demand. At the same time, in the face of hard constraints on resource conditions and the ecological environment, all localities adhered to the concept of green development in grain production, implemented the "zero growth" action for chemical fertilizers and pesticides, and advanced the resource utilization of waste such as straw, achieving a transformation and upgrading of the production mode. It can be said that this year's bumper harvest is not only a harvest in quantity, but also a harvest in quality, a harvest in efficiency, and a green harvest, and carries multiple layers of significance.