What impact does the Soil Ten Plan have on livestock production?

A few days ago, the State Council issued the Action Plan for Soil Pollution Prevention and Control (referred to as the "Soil Ten Plan"). This is another action plan for pollution prevention and environmental protection following the "Air Ten Plan" and the "Water Ten Plan", and its starting point is to ensure the quality of agricultural products and the safety of the human living environment. The plan sets stricter requirements for agricultural product production and the environment of production areas.

The production of livestock and poultry products is an important part of agricultural product production, and in accordance with the requirements of the "Soil Ten Plan", it will also face major changes. First, the "Soil Ten Plan" clearly states that the layout and scale of livestock and poultry breeding should be reasonably determined in light of regional functional positioning and the needs of soil pollution prevention and control. This not only adds restrictive conditions for livestock and poultry breeding, but also optimizes the conditions of production areas, making product quality more secure, and further optimizing the layout and scale of livestock and poultry breeding. Second, the "Soil Ten Plan" points out that the comprehensive utilization of livestock and poultry manure should be strengthened, and pilots for the organic integration of planting and breeding and circular development should be carried out in some major pig-producing counties. This will promote the rapid development of the livestock and poultry breeding industry toward circular animal husbandry and green animal husbandry. Third, the "Soil Ten Plan" advocates studying and formulating incentive policies to support enterprises producing organic fertilizer and others, and carrying out pilot trials of an environmental protection leader system. It encourages the establishment of livestock and poultry product production mechanisms linked to soil pollution control.

At the same time, livestock practitioners will also face the dual pressure of livestock and poultry breeding supervision and breeding pollution prevention and control. How can this pressure be relieved? Efforts can be made in the following aspects.

First, it is necessary to firmly grasp the policies and strictly implement them. Livestock practitioners should earnestly understand the spirit of policies such as the "Soil Ten Plan", identify the favorable aspects and unfavorable factors in the policies, understand and comply with policy requirements from the perspective of promoting sustainable economic, social and ecological development, advance industrial innovation, and promote enterprise transformation and upgrading.

Second, it is necessary to increase enterprises' scientific and technological innovation efforts. This includes the input stage of livestock and poultry breeding production, the stage of production and operation systems and mechanisms, and the stage of pollutant treatment, among others, to continuously reduce breeding costs, improve product quality and raise production efficiency.

Third, it is necessary to actively fulfill the responsibilities for soil pollution prevention and control. It is necessary to fulfill the primary responsibility of enterprises for pollution prevention and control, strengthen corporate self-discipline, actively assume social responsibility, give play to enterprises' advantages, consciously minimize the impact of livestock and poultry breeding on the ecological environment, and strive to become practitioners and leaders of green breeding.