Family Farms Become a New Path for Farmers to Get Rich
Our reporter Cheng Chuanjun
In the early autumn season, the land of western Anhui presents a delightful scene of bumper harvests everywhere. The reporter came to Zhongping Family Farm in Xigang Village, Qingshan Township, Yu'an District, where free-range local chickens and flocks of white geese were scattered everywhere under the trees across the hillsides. On the farm, modern livestock housing, a small reservoir with rippling blue waves, and ornamental trees swaying in the autumn wind together resembled a beautiful pastoral ecological landscape.
Yi Zhengzhong, the 45-year-old farm owner, and his wife Zhang Qingping were busily working on the hillside, thoroughly enjoying themselves. While feeding the waddling, clumsy Wanxi white geese, they also had to organize family members to catch the local chickens, each one like a "sprite," for sale outside. When talk turned to their "recipe for wealth," this farm owner, his skin tanned dark, became especially excited. Full of confidence, he said: "I have already sold 22,000 local chickens this year, and I currently have 32,000 in stock. Annual output value will exceed 10 million yuan, and my family should have no problem making 500,000 yuan this year."
Compared with agricultural professional cooperatives, family farms appear smaller in industrial scale, but how to achieve distinctive development and find profit space can be answered at Yi Zhengzhong's family farm. Zhongping Family Farm is mainly engaged in the ecological breeding of local chickens and Wanxi white geese. The labor force consists mainly of relatives and friends of the family. Through more than a year of successful practice and exploration, this approach not only saved investment and operating costs but also improved economic efficiency, giving Yi Zhengzhong a personal sense that starting a family farm is a very good path to increasing income and becoming prosperous.
One spot reveals the whole leopard. The continuous growth of new types of agricultural business entities has important practical significance for promoting farmers' income growth and prosperity. According to Wang Shanwu, section chief of the Economic Management Section of the Municipal Agriculture Committee, since April 2013, the city's first family farm - Qiyunshan Family Farm in Dushan Town, Yu'an District - was registered. For more than a year, family farms across the city have shown a blowout development trend, with 6 major characteristics. The number developed has increased rapidly. At present, the city has developed 786 family farms. Registration types are diverse: 619 individually owned businesses, 155 sole proprietorship enterprises, and 12 limited liability companies. Business types are diversified, involving grain and oil, vegetables, tea, Chinese medicinal materials, livestock and poultry, aquatic products, leisure agriculture and many other fields. Among them, 486 are planting-related, 251 are breeding-related, and 49 are other agricultural services. Operating scale has expanded, with an average planting scale of 260 mu and a breeding scale of 1,200 birds. Operating strength has improved, with average registered capital of 200,000 yuan per household. The number of employees is stable, with an average of 3.6 year-round employees per household.
Development approaches like that of Zhongping Family Farm are thriving in all parts of the city. Maotanchang Town in Jin'an District regards family farms as an important means of increasing farmers' income and achieving prosperity under the new situation. The town has developed 15 family farms, involving industries such as oil tea, and established more than 7,500 mu of industrial bases. Shiqiao Town has taken effective measures to actively guide the people to concentrate local scattered land for contiguous development, focus on cultivating family farms, and achieve remarkable results in helping farmers increase income. The town currently has 15 family farms and has transferred 8,600 mu of land. Xiuwu Special Breeding Family Farm in Huoshan County comprehensively breeds special aquatic products such as leeches and crayfish. Its base has grown to 140 mu, and last year it achieved a net income of more than 100,000 yuan.
Family farms are the foundation of modern agricultural industrialization, but affected by factors such as capital, technology and scale, it is difficult for their scale and industrialization level to develop deeply and sustainably. How to both give play to the role of family farms "blooming everywhere" and enhance the scale economic benefits of family farms, make the agricultural industrial chain bigger and stronger, and realize agricultural industrialization requires exploring new modern agricultural operation models. For this reason, not long ago, the municipal government specially issued the "Implementation Opinions on Cultivating and Developing Family Farms," focusing on forming a joint force to jointly support the development of family farms. In projects such as comprehensive agricultural development, land consolidation and farmland water conservancy construction, preference will be given to family farms. Finance departments at all levels across the city have increased support for family farms, adopting methods such as direct subsidies and awards in place of subsidies to support family farms in carrying out agricultural product quality and safety certification, infrastructure construction, processing and storage, and marketing.
Strengthening the implementation of support measures is the key to advancing the development of family farms. The reporter learned during interviews that our city conducts an annual special assessment of the cultivation and development of family farms. Starting in 2015, municipal and county/district finance departments should include funds for cultivating and developing family farms in their budgets. The municipal level arranged 3 million yuan, and the fiscal budget will increase year by year according to development conditions. Socialized services for family farms will be strengthened. Contracted land will be guided to flow to family farms. Agricultural insurance services will be strengthened. Family farms will be guided to strengthen the quality and safety construction of agricultural products. Relevant policies involving agriculture-related construction projects, tax incentives and facility land use will be implemented to help solve difficulties and problems encountered in the development of family farms.
Next, our city will further advance unions and cooperation, continuously improve the degree of agricultural organization, encourage family farms to lead or participate in establishing farmers' cooperatives, cultivate a group of family farms that cooperate with urban communities, agricultural product trading markets and retail shopping malls and implement direct supply and direct sales, and actively advance the construction of an industrial system with leading enterprises as the core, cooperatives as the link and family farms as the foundation, while actively exploring the establishment of modern agricultural industrial consortiums.