Advancing the comprehensive reform of supply and marketing cooperatives to build a vital force and comprehensive platform for serving farmers' production and daily life

--An exclusive interview with Wang Xia, Director of the Board of Directors of the All China Federation of Supply and Marketing Cooperatives

On April 25, when General Secretary Xi Jinping spoke at the rural reform symposium about the need for multi-factor coordination in deepening rural reform, he explicitly pointed out the need to advance the comprehensive reform of supply and marketing cooperatives. A journalist recently interviewed Wang Xia, Director of the Board of Directors of the All China Federation of Supply and Marketing Cooperatives, on thoroughly studying and implementing the spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping's important speech in Xiaogang Village.

A strong signal: rural reform will only deepen, not stall

Wang Xia said in the interview that General Secretary Xi Jinping's important speech in Xiaogang Village is both lofty and far-sighted, and also down-to-earth and highly satisfying. It provided profound elaboration and answers on the most urgent and realistic major theoretical and practical issues in current rural reform and development. For the national supply and marketing cooperative system, this is both encouragement and a spur. The Party Leadership Group and the Board of Directors of the All China Federation held a meeting immediately to study and convey the spirit of the General Secretary's important speech in Xiaogang Village, unify thought and action with the spirit of the General Secretary's important speech, and further strengthen confidence and determination to deepen the comprehensive reform of supply and marketing cooperatives.

Wang Xia said that General Secretary Xi's speech is another mobilization and deployment on rural reform since the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee of the Party. It pointed out the direction, clarified the bottom line, and provided guidance for doing the work related to agriculture, rural areas and farmers well, and is a programmatic document guiding the work related to agriculture, rural areas and farmers under new historical conditions. The speech fully reflects the General Secretary's deep feelings for agriculture, rural areas and farmers, fully reflects the General Secretary's profound understanding and accurate grasp of the laws governing the work related to agriculture, rural areas and farmers, and reflects the General Secretary's clear-cut attitude toward advancing rural reform. Xiaogang Village is the birthplace of China's rural reform. The General Secretary held the rural reform symposium here, which is itself a declaration and a strong signal to the whole society that rural reform will only deepen and will not stall. Since the Eighteenth National Congress of the Party, rural productive forces have achieved new liberation, farmers' incomes have continuously reached new levels, and rural society has taken on a new atmosphere. These are vivid manifestations of the results of rural reform.

Four main tasks: give play to the unique advantages of supply and marketing cooperatives, shore up weak links and make up for shortcomings

General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized in his speech that at present, agriculture is still a weak link in modernization, and rural areas are still a weak link in building a moderately prosperous society in all respects, and solving the various contradictions and problems facing agricultural and rural development fundamentally depends on deepening reform. Wang Xia said that in recent years supply and marketing cooperatives have always adhered to the purpose of serving agriculture and accelerated the deepening of comprehensive reform. Only in this way can they give play to their unique advantages and role in the field related to agriculture, rural areas and farmers.

First, focusing on solving the problem of "who will farm the land", efforts have been made to promote socialized services such as land trusteeship. On the basis of summarizing experience in Shandong and other places, supply and marketing cooperatives have actively promoted the land trusteeship service model. After land trusteeship, without changing the land contract relationship, management rights have been revitalized, promoting large-scale and intensive agricultural production. Through trusteeship services such as planting and cultivating on behalf of farmers, unified prevention and control, and drying and storage, wheat and corn save costs and increase income by about 400 yuan per mu on average, and the figure is even higher for cash crops. At present, the land trusteeship service of supply and marketing cooperatives has expanded to more than 10 provinces including Shandong, Henan, Hubei and Anhui, with a trusteeship area of more than 60 million mu. Land trusteeship has become a calling card of supply and marketing cooperatives in serving agriculture.

Second, focusing on solving the problem of "difficulty in selling" agricultural products, efforts have been accelerated to build modern agricultural product markets. Supply and marketing cooperatives have newly built and renovated more than 300 agricultural product wholesale markets in main producing areas, main sales areas and distribution centers. At present, the total number of agricultural product markets in the whole system has reached 1,100, among which wholesale markets with an annual transaction volume of more than 100 million yuan account for 20% of the whole society. Supply and marketing cooperatives in Zhejiang, Shaanxi, Chongqing and other places have also promoted production-sales alignment, directly supplying high-quality agricultural products from cooperative bases to government organs, enterprises and institutions, and urban communities, benefiting both farmers and urban residents. At the same time, they have actively developed agricultural product e-commerce and promoted the integrated development of online and offline operations. Last year, the All China Federation established a nationwide e-commerce platform, "Gongxiao e-Home", with more than 25,000 listed varieties, of which more than 90% are agricultural products. Specialty agricultural products from poor mountainous areas in Jiangxi, Sichuan, Guizhou and other places have opened up sales channels through the e-commerce platform of supply and marketing cooperatives, promoting increases in farmers' incomes.

Third, focusing on promoting farmers' income growth and prosperity, efforts have been actively made to advance the integrated development of the primary, secondary and tertiary industries. Increasing farmers' incomes is one of the three major tasks of rural development emphasized by General Secretary Xi. Supply and marketing cooperatives help local areas cultivate specialty industries, promote the local transformation and value-added processing of agricultural products, and enable farmers to share in agricultural value-added benefits at their doorstep. Hunan Provincial Tea Company adopts the industrialization model of "company + cooperative + farmer households", establishes 570,000 mu of high-quality tea garden bases, and through equity participation and holding, exclusive sales, and rebates, forms close interest ties with 350,000 tea farmer households, implements protective price purchasing, and increases each tea farmer household's average annual income by 6,500 yuan. The Qianshan supply and marketing cooperative in Anhui promotes the local Trichosanthes kirilowii seed industry. The county has more than 6,000 farmer households growing Trichosanthes kirilowii seeds, and the Trichosanthes kirilowii seed industry has become the county's largest agricultural industry.

Another aspect is focusing on the upgrading of farmers' needs brought by urbanization and extensively carrying out comprehensive community services. Promoting the orderly citizenization of the agricultural transferred population and improving the institutional mechanisms for integrated urban-rural development are important tasks of agricultural reform emphasized by General Secretary Xi. Focusing on farmers' new living needs, supply and marketing cooperatives have vigorously developed rural comprehensive service centers and continuously innovated service methods and service content. At present, supply and marketing cooperatives have developed 360,000 community comprehensive service centers nationwide, covering more than 50% of administrative villages, providing farmers with convenient and practical comprehensive services such as daily necessities sales, technical training, elderly care and preschool education, and employment guidance, and have played a positive role in promoting the improvement of rural social governance.

Closer interest ties with farmers, more complete service functions for farmers

Wang Xia said that at present supply and marketing cooperatives nationwide must thoroughly implement the spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping's important speech, earnestly implement the spirit of Document No. 11 of the Central Committee, comprehensively deepen the comprehensive reform of supply and marketing cooperatives, and accelerate the building of a vital force and comprehensive platform for serving farmers' production and daily life. The main areas of focus in the work are the following four aspects:

First, adhere to serving agriculture, working for agriculture and belonging to agriculture, and accelerate the formation of more complete service functions for agriculture. On the premise of respecting farmers' wishes and safeguarding farmers' rights and interests, it is necessary to further improve and promote the land trusteeship service model, extend land trusteeship services to suitable areas nationwide, extend them from grain crops such as wheat and rice to cash crops such as forest fruits, and actively explore trusteeship methods suitable for different regions and different crops. At the same time, in accordance with the requirements of supply-side structural reform in agriculture, actively advance the integrated development of the primary, secondary and tertiary industries in agriculture, vigorously develop agricultural product e-commerce, accelerate the building of the agricultural product market system, provide farmers with services across the entire industrial chain of production, processing and circulation, and enable farmers to share more value-added benefits from the industrial chain.

Second, consolidate the grassroots foundation and form closer interest ties with farmers. The grassroots level is the frontline position for supply and marketing cooperatives to carry out services for agriculture. Various measures should be taken to advance the classified transformation of grassroots cooperatives. Attention should be paid to the standardized development of grassroots cooperatives, and the focus of work should shift from "expanding coverage" to "improving quality", ensuring that once grassroots cooperatives achieve coverage, they can stand firm and secure, and become an effective position for carrying out services. In accordance with the principle of cooperatives, improve the internal management mechanism and interest linkage mechanism of grassroots cooperatives, closely link grassroots cooperatives with farmers organizationally and economically, and form a community of shared interests with farmers.

Third, strengthen the self-development of federations of cooperatives and form a more efficient market-oriented operating mechanism. Earnestly implement the requirements of General Secretary Xi's important speech, and in the direction of separating government functions from institutional operations and separating the cooperative from enterprises, accelerate the improvement of the governance structure of federations of supply and marketing cooperatives, and constantly stimulate internal motivation and development vitality. It is necessary to accelerate the transformation of the administrative tendencies of federation organs, establish thinking concepts and working methods consistent with the characteristics of cooperative economic organizations, and use more market-based and economic methods to promote work. It is necessary to further clarify administrative management functions, industry guidance functions and operational service functions, especially straighten out the relationship between the cooperative and enterprises, and accelerate the building of a dual-line operating mechanism composed of an industry guidance system and an operational service system. It is necessary to maintain close ties at all levels and, through means such as industry guidance, property rights integration and business cooperation, advance multi-level joint cooperation and form an overall synergy for serving agriculture.

Fourth, adhere to steady and solid progress and ensure the sustained and healthy development of supply and marketing cooperatives. General Secretary Xi emphasized at the symposium that rural reform must achieve the "four cannots". Supply and marketing cooperatives must earnestly implement the important instructions of General Secretary Xi and ensure that: no matter how reforms are carried out, the purpose of serving agriculture cannot be lost, the systemic advantages and scale advantages cannot be lost, cooperative assets cannot be reduced, the direction of moving along the market economy cannot be deviated from, and "one-size-fits-all" approaches cannot be adopted. In the process of comprehensive reform, it is necessary both to explore boldly and to manage risks well, hold the bottom line and red line, avoid turmoil and repeated reversals, ensure that each undertaking succeeds, and ensure that reform advances smoothly and the economy operates steadily.