The practical problem of orderly transfer of farmland what should farmers do after land transfer

At the end of 2014, the Office of the CPC Central Committee and the Office of the State Council issued the opinions on guiding the orderly transfer of Rural Land Management Rights to develop appropriate scale Management of Agriculture (hereinafter referred to as "opinions"). Under the premise of adhering to the household contract responsibility system, the goal of "guiding the orderly circulation of rural land (contracted cultivated land) and developing appropriate scale operation of agriculture" was put forward. The introduction of "opinions" indicates that the transfer of agricultural land will enter a new stage, but how to respond to the realistic requirements of this important reform issue in practice needs to be clarified.

What should farmers do after the land transfer?

Han Changfu, minister of agriculture, said in an interview with reporters on the introduction of the "opinion," that the "opinion" is a major institutional innovation, theoretical innovation, and practical innovation in China's land system reform. His reason is that in the field of agricultural land, there was only the "separation of two rights" between the collective ownership of land and the contracted management right of farmers, while the "opinion" put forward the "separation of three rights" of land ownership, contract right and management right.

The "separation of powers" has existed for a long time in practice, and the practice of "separation of powers" of agricultural land has existed for how long the large-scale transfer of labor from rural areas to cities has lasted. The reason is very simple: a large number of farmers who go out to work will not allow their land to be abandoned, so they will certainly transfer their land within the village community.

Spontaneous land transfer is carried out among acquaintances, generally speaking, it has the following characteristics: first, the rent is low, and in many cases, the circulation side will no longer collect rent after taking state subsidies; second, the agreement on the circulation period is flexible and the work is not smooth. You can go home at any time to harvest the land and then plant it; third, there is no major change in the use of what is originally planted.

This kind of land transfer is adapted to the current actual situation in China. The statistics of China's urbanization rate of more than 40 percent are based on the calculation of more than 200 million migrant workers as the urban population, but they have not completed the process of entering the cities at all, and the reproduction of labor force is still heavily dependent on rural areas.

In the wake of the crisis in 2008, there was a wave of unemployment among migrant workers in China, forcing tens of millions of workers to leave their factories. In any country, this will be a major social problem, but in China, the problem is resolved in the invisible. The secret lies in the special land system. Tens of millions of migrant workers who have lost their jobs from factories do not need to wander in the streets, but go home and farm the land and come out when the situation is good.

We cannot say that such a system is good, but we should say that it is the least bad and can prevent worse things from happening.

Is it time to change this institutional framework? The state guides agricultural land to be pooled to "new agricultural operators" such as family farms, professional large households, and leading enterprises, and the pattern of rural management must have undergone qualitative changes a few years later. If the macro-economy fluctuates again at that time (which is very likely), what if a large number of migrant workers lose their jobs?

What we are worried about is that after the land transfer, if the unemployed migrant workers who return home in the future can no longer get their land back and return to their original life track, even if the rent of the land transfer can support them not to starve to death, then they will also become people who have nothing to do.

It can be seen that the goal put forward by the opinion is correct, and there are indeed some problems such as too small pieces of rural land and the need for large-scale operation, but to solve these problems, we should first solve the problem of the real settlement of migrant workers in the city. Only when migrant workers really integrate into the cities, they do not need to return to their hometown when they retire, and they can be relocated locally when they are unemployed, can rural land be transferred in an orderly manner.

Farmers should be allowed to earn more capital to make money.

From the perspective of agriculture, the purpose of land transfer is to "optimize the allocation of land resources and improve labor productivity", "ensure food security and the supply of major agricultural products"; from the perspective of farmers, land transfer is to realize the property rights of farmers. The goals are all good, but whether the goals can be achieved is another matter.

At present, the mode of land transfer tried in practice is generally like this: leading enterprises transfer farmers' land according to a certain rent, promise to pay dividends to farmers, and farmers can also be employed as agricultural workers. Logically, farmers have two incomes of land rent and wages, which is much more profitable than the original farming; agricultural capital can also make a profit after the efficiency is improved. But is it possible?

Agricultural labor is different from office work and factory assembly line work, the most important feature is that it is difficult to assess. Farmers describe farming as "serving crops". Since it is "serving", attitude is the key. one more bend and one more drop of sweat will have an impact on output, but there is no way to be included in the performance appraisal system. Family management is recognized as the most effective mode of agricultural production, which is not unreasonable, because farmers do not take into account labor input under this system. If you become an agricultural worker, motivation will become a problem again, and the leading enterprises will have the same headache as the people's communes at that time: do well and do bad.

The advantage of agricultural scale operation is only that the per capita output is higher than that of household operation, and if it is higher than per mu, scale operation is doomed to lose to small-scale peasant economy. In order to give full play to the advantages of land scale operation, the requirement of land-to-population ratio is extremely high, for example, under the premise of mechanization, one person manages thousands or even tens of thousands of mu of land. However, this business model cannot be realized in China, because the actual situation in our country is that there are many people and little land. In this regard, the "opinion" also clearly puts forward that land circulation "should not only pay attention to improve the scale operation of land, but also prevent excessive concentration of land. Strike a balance between efficiency and fairness".

There is no doubt that this requirement of the opinion is correct, but under the premise that efficiency cannot be greatly improved (or may even decline), it is not easy to make money for both higher income for farmers and money for capital.

Farmers: benefit or damage?

I am afraid that governments at all levels are aware of the setting of unachievable dual goals. No one will do the trading at a loss, so the way to promote the circulation will become to subsidize all kinds of "large households". In this way, the "large households" of the land transfer will make profits and the government will have political achievements. In the future, I am afraid that land transfer will have to be supported by this model. The "opinion" makes it clear that "the new agricultural subsidies are tilted to the new agricultural operators."

From the perspective of farmers who have transferred their land, they may get substantial benefits in the short term because the land rent has increased; but there is a question mark as to whether this income can be sustained. In reality, many agricultural enterprises have run away at a loss. Enterprises have closed down, and of course the land rent will not be paid again. If the use of the land has been changed, for example, from a field for growing grain to a greenhouse for growing vegetables, farmers will have to invest money if they want to adjust the land to its familiar use. in the end, it is hard to say whether it will make a profit or lose.

Land is an immovable element, and this characteristic is most obvious in circulation. If each household invests 10,000, 10,000 households will be able to gather 100 million funds, forming the scale effect of funds; but if each household gives 1 mu of arable land, 10,000 households may not be able to gather 10,000 mu for large-scale operation, unless these 10,000 mu of land happen to be linked together. Investors can redeem funds at any time, but those who transfer land cannot redeem land at any time.

The "opinion" clearly points out: "without the written entrustment of farmers, rural grass-roots organizations do not have the right to decide in any way the contracted land for the transfer of farmers, let alone in the name of a minority subordinating to the majority. Concentrate the whole group of contracted land of farmers in the village to attract foreign investment. To prevent a small number of grass-roots cadres from giving and receiving each other privately and to seek private interests. " For the purpose of preventing infringing upon the interests of farmers, such a regulation is good, but the characteristics of the land determine that the circulation of agricultural land needs to be dominated by land owners and collectives, because there is a "nail household" in a village. large-scale transfer cannot be realized. This is a difficult problem to be faced in practice.

I am afraid that the significance of land transfer to farmers is not as great as that of some intermediate organizations waiting to profit from the circulation, as evidenced by the emergence of a large number of land transfer e-commerce platforms and the development of financial instruments such as land transfer trusts. If the policy goal of agricultural land transfer conflicts with the vital interests of farmers and the stability of the whole society, then the latter must be given priority.