Farmers in Jianping County, Liaoning, earn dual incomes through land transfer

Jianping County in Liaoning Province has effectively advanced rational land transfer and promoted large-scale agricultural operations, opening a new win-win path of higher land efficiency and higher farmer incomes. Letting farmers work near their homes not only raised land utilization but also increased farmers' incomes.

Lu Caihua said that she and her husband had always worked the land at home, but after leasing their several dozen mu of land to Yuling Agricultural Machinery Cooperative last year, her husband went to work at an enterprise in the township and she was hired by the cooperative. Her monthly wages alone amount to several thousand yuan, and she commutes on schedule every day, making her a genuine "office worker." "The rent for the leased farmland is collected annually, wages are calculated monthly, and we farmers can collect two 'paychecks' right at our doorstep," Lu Caihua said happily.

Villager Chen Yuqin, from the same village as Lu Caihua, transferred her family's land to Yuling Agricultural Machinery Cooperative back in 2014. Her husband first went to work at an iron ore enterprise, and because the business was struggling he came to Yuling Agricultural Machinery Cooperative. Today both husband and wife are "office workers" at the cooperative.

In recent years, Jianping County has taken the cultivation of new types of agricultural business entities as its main focus, comprehensively improved the county, township and village three-tier land transfer service system, and steadily advanced large-scale land operations. The number of new agricultural business entities across the county has grown from fewer than 300 in 2012 to 1,121 today. At present, the county's transferred land area exceeds roughly 600,000 mu, which has both stabilized grain production and increased farmers' incomes.

Lidi Dahai