Who solves the dilemma of growing grain when the price of grain such as wheat and corn goes down?

Shandong Academy of Agricultural Sciences recently held wheat "two deep and one shallow" light simplified cultivation technique training in Matou Town, Dongming County. Photo by Cao Fengqin

The decline in grain prices has further affected the enthusiasm of farmers to grow grain. It also has a negative impact on land circulation and scale operation, and even shows signs of the contractor withdrawing the lease.

Cao Fengqin, reporter of the ◆ newspaper, reporting from Yanggu Dongming.

"1.15 yuan per jin, I sold all over 40,000 jin." On the 23rd, Xiuyong, a farmer in Yanggu County, told the Economic Herald that when the wheat was first harvested, the market purchase price was still 1.18 yuan / jin. Considering that the price of wheat reached 1.3 yuan / jin last year, he wanted to wait and see. Who knows, since August, the purchase price of wheat has been declining continuously, and even fell to 1.07 yuan / jin at the beginning of October. Although the market price has rebounded recently, it has been hovering between 1.13 yuan and 1.15 yuan per jin. "I think people in the industry analyze that the price of wheat market may still fall, so they don't dare to wait any longer." Xiu Yong said.

A reporter from the leading newspaper learned that the entry of foreign low-cost agricultural products into the domestic market has led to a large backlog of inventory and low prices of domestic agricultural products. At the same time, the price of labor in China continues to rise, and the decentralized operation of farmers is still the main body, resulting in high production costs of agricultural products.

Since the beginning of autumn this year, the prices of corn and wheat in the main grain producing areas have fallen to varying degrees. Corn prices fell significantly, with the highest drop of 40% compared with last year. The decline in grain prices has further affected the enthusiasm of farmers to grow grain. It also has a negative impact on land circulation and scale operation, and even shows signs of the contractor withdrawing the lease.

The willingness to lease land is declining.

"the food is cheap, and it is not easy to rent the land out." Wu Fang, a farmer in Gaomiaowang Township, Yanggu County, is 67 years old this year, and the increase in age makes him somewhat unable to grow the land. he wants to subcontract the land to others, but he asks many villagers that they have no intention to contract. "it's easy to pack up 1000 yuan per mu of land a year."

"it was OK when the price of grain was high, but now the price of grain is so low that it doesn't make money at all." Xiu Yong told the newspaper reporter that although the land transfer has been rolled out in an all-round way, and there is a trend of deepening day by day, at present, most of the people who contract out the land are families composed of "left-behind elderly people" and "left-behind children," which is still quite a long way from large-scale transfer. Although the degree of mechanization has been increasing in recent years, due to the scattered land of farmers, it has set up obstacles to the unified change of planting structure, so that the level of grain production technology and mechanization is low, and the production cost is relatively high. "you can make a season in a good time."

If household labor discounts and self-rent discounts are not taken into account, the average production cost of wheat this year is 421.89 yuan, up 4.91 percent from a year earlier, according to the Liaocheng agricultural department.

On the surface, the high input and high subsidy of growing grain in our country have increased the income of farmers, but in fact, including government subsidies, a large part of it has been transformed into the input of growing grain. After calculation, experts found that the net profit of one mu of wheat last year was 87 yuan, and the price of grain with high yield of wheat fell sharply this year. Although the yield of one mu of wheat is higher than that of last year, the net income of one mu of wheat is only 33 yuan. If you encounter some more natural disasters, growing grain will lose money and become a high probability event.

Wu Chunlai, a 40-year-old grain grower, told the newspaper that since 2007, he has successively contracted the arable land of the families of migrant workers in the village. At present, it has reached 70 to 80 mu. Because it is too scattered, although grain prices have risen year after year, the income is not very good. The price of wheat has gone down this year, and the price of corn has dropped from 1.3 yuan / jin last year to 0.83 yuan / jin. In addition, the lodging of corn in autumn cannot be harvested mechanically, which has increased the cost of hiring people. "it's about a waste of work. I'm going to return all the land when it's due next year." Wu Chunlai thought.

The big grain growers even feel that they are in dire straits. A large grain grower, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said in an interview with a reporter from the leading newspaper that at present, many large grain growers are struggling to maintain and operate at a loss. He believes that falling prices and high planting costs will inevitably dampen farmers' enthusiasm for growing grain in the long run. "once the number of farmers leasing land is reduced, the proportion of land transfer will be reduced, which is not conducive to the development of family farms and farmers' professional cooperatives that the state has always encouraged."

Low-cost planting to increase efficiency

"at present, wheat, as one of the main food rations in China, should take the way to reduce production costs and improve grain efficiency in order to cope with international competition." A few days ago, at the wheat "two deep and one shallow" light simplified cultivation technique training and autumn sowing site held by the Shandong Academy of Agricultural Sciences in Matou Town, Dongming County, Wang Fahong, a post expert in the national wheat industrial technology system and an expert in wheat cultivation at the Provincial Academy of Agricultural Sciences, told the reporter that the wheat "two deep and one shallow" light simplified cultivation technique is such a technology that can both save cost and increase efficiency.

In view of the current production situation of high sowing rate, over-fertilization (nitrogen fertilizer), too frequent watering and too much mechanical operation in Shandong Province, this technology is a high-yield and high-efficiency cultivation technology of wheat innovated and integrated by the crops of Shandong Academy of Agricultural Sciences. many key links such as rotary tillage of seedling belt, vibration deep loosening, fertilizer layered deep application, equal depth uniform sowing and post-sowing suppression are completed at one time, saving labor and time.

"'two depths' refers to deep loosening operations to break the bottom of the plough and deep fertilization to improve fertilizer efficiency, and 'shallow' refers to appropriate shallow sowing to ensure the sowing quality of wheat and cultivate strong seedlings." Wang Fahong said that compared with the traditional technology, the mechanical operation fee per mu of land is reduced by more than 70 yuan, the sowing rate is reduced by about half to 15 to 20 jin, and the amount of fertilizer application is reduced by 15% to 20%. Moreover, deep loosening breaks the bottom of the plough, improves the deep soil structure, is beneficial to the root system, and the deep application of base fertilizer increases the fertilizer use efficiency, and the wheat can increase by about 10% per mu.

Ma Guoxing, chairman of the Maifeng Wheat planting Professional Cooperative in Dongming County, calculated an account for the newspaper reporter. By adopting this cultivation technique, it can not only save costs, but also produce more than 100 jin of wheat per mu, saving cost and increasing efficiency by 200 yuan per mu of land. "in 2013, the cooperative set aside 100 mu of land for an experiment, and it earned more than 20,000 yuan in one season." Ma Guoxing said that in 2014, he bought 10 matching new planters, which expanded the planting area to 13000 mu, and made significant gains this summer. "sowing in autumn this year, we are going to fully cover the wheat planting of the cooperative, totaling more than 26000 mu."

Lu Bo, director of the planting Management Office of the Shandong Provincial Department of Agriculture, said that the "two deep and one shallow" wheat cultivation techniques have been simplified, effectively solving the problems of scattered planting and high production costs of grain in every household, and is an innovation in the mode of grain production in Shandong.

Liaocheng Price Bureau also recently released the 2015 Wheat cost-benefit Survey in Liaocheng, suggesting to increase financial support for agriculture, improve grain production conditions, and strengthen the supporting role of science and technology in grain production. Centering on improving the direct subsidy system for grain farmers' income, agricultural materials subsidies and market supervision system, we should establish an income guarantee system for grain farmers, speed up the insurance business of planting industry, and ensure farmers' enthusiasm for growing grain; in addition, we should further do a good job in rural land circulation, increase support for large grain growers, implement scientific and unified land management, reduce costs, and increase production capacity.