Recycling of agricultural residual film requires a multi-party collaborative framework

In 1979, China introduced plastic film mulching cultivation technology from Japan. Because of its remarkable effects on increasing crop yields and enabling off-season planting, the use of plastic film quickly expanded from small-scale trials to large-scale application. Especially in the arid and rain-sparse northwest region of China, film mulching cultivation even launched a "white revolution" in agricultural farming, once setting an agricultural miracle of 1500 jin of corn per mu in dryland farming areas with average annual precipitation of around 300 mm.

Due to the proliferation of ultra-thin plastic film, the loss of rural labor, and the lack of suitable recycling machinery, more and more plastic film remained in the soil, and the white revolution gradually became white pollution, seriously affecting the sustainable development of China's agriculture. However, farmers' habit of using plastic film has become very difficult to change. China's annual plastic film usage amounts to over one million tons, and it is still increasing at a rate of 15% per year. Therefore, whether from the perspective of stabilizing grain production and increasing income or from the perspective of sustainable agricultural development, residual film recycling is an urgent problem.

To fundamentally solve residual film pollution, we must start from the source. The ideal state is for plastic film manufacturers to produce biodegradable plastic film. However, the retail price of traditional plastic film is about 10,000 yuan/ton, while the retail price of biodegradable film is 30,000 yuan/ton. Calculated at 10 kg per mu, the input per mu would increase by 300 yuan. Without high subsidies, biodegradable film will still be difficult to promote and apply on a large scale in agricultural production for some time. Therefore, mechanical recycling of residual film has become an important means of solving the residual film problem. At the same time, because tractors enter the fields more frequently, this leads to soil compaction to a certain extent. Therefore, we should also consider improving the efficiency of machinery use, reducing operating costs, reducing the number of times machinery enters the fields, and increasing efforts to encourage and support agricultural machinery enterprises in developing machinery that combines land preparation and residual film recycling operations.

For residual film recycling machines to be better promoted and used, they depend on the recycling and utilization of residual film. Although mechanized residual film recycling is highly efficient, it does not produce direct economic benefits in the short term. Many farmers believe that specially renting machines to collect residual film is not worthwhile, making mechanized residual film recycling difficult for people to accept. Therefore, in developing mechanical residual film recycling, in addition to combining it with conventional operations for joint operations, the government should also pay attention to the reuse of residual film. If farmers can obtain economic benefits from selling residual film, this will naturally promote the use of mechanical residual film recycling machines and further promote the healthy development of collection points and pelletizing enterprises. Only by forming an agricultural residual film recycling and utilization network supported by four mutually reinforcing links - mechanical recycling, farmer collection, collection point purchasing, and enterprise processing - can a multi-party win-win situation of increased farmer income, enterprise profit, and ecological restoration gradually take shape.

It can thus be seen that Ningxia's approach to residual film recycling governance over more than two years is correct: developing new machinery to improve recycling efficiency, limiting film thickness to achieve integration of machinery and agronomy, establishing a recycling system to support processing enterprises, and turning residual film recycling into an industry. This collaborative framework of "government promotion, enterprise leadership, market drive, and farmer participation" can indeed serve as an effective strategy for solving residual plastic film pollution.