Agriculture is only suitable for people with feelings.

Document No. 1 was issued again, and people all over the country began to talk about agriculture again.

Such a scene takes place at this time of year. If I remember correctly, the enthusiasm for agriculture will gradually cool down and then disappear shortly after the "two sessions". This phenomenon is described by an idiom, that is, a dead end.

As you can see, I'm not here to sing hymns.

Another phenomenon that accompanies the agricultural drama, document No. 1, which is staged at the beginning of spring every year, is such articles in the major media as "the opportunity for agriculture has come", "the next hot spot for investment is agriculture", "agriculture is ushering in a golden age" and so on. You will find that there was such an article two years ago, two years later, and two years ago, and four years ago, four years ago. These articles are well-founded and can be described as a lack of insight and policy insights. But after watching too much, I can't help but wonder: has the opportunity for agriculture come in the end?

When will you come?

There are no opportunities in agriculture.

Ten years ago, when I first began to engage in rural policy research, the country began to mention the construction of a new countryside. For a while, I had a feeling of beating chicken blood, and I was very keen to preach that "the opportunity for agriculture has come." When people know that I am engaged in rural work, they often ask me if there are great opportunities for development in rural areas. My answer not only tells them yes, but also gives a vivid picture of the opportunities for agriculture. As for the "No. 1 document for ten years in a row" and so on, it is also given to others when it is mentioned. Many people were bewildered by me and went into agriculture. In the following days, on the one hand, I continued to cheat like this, on the other hand, I began to answer the questions that those who had been tricked into engaging in agriculture had complained about in agricultural production and management activities. Of course, the answer to these questions is also very simple: agriculture is an industry with a long cycle and slow results, which can not be achieved overnight. Don't do agriculture with the mentality of being eager for success. There is no doubt that such an answer is a standard answer that can be agreed by both the opposition and the opposition, and no one has ever questioned it.

However, I gradually discovered that the problems encountered by those who want to develop in agriculture for various reasons are not only due to the long cycle of agriculture itself, but also to the lack of a good grasp of the national agricultural policy. Some people have invested tens of millions of dollars in a certain agricultural project for more than a decade, but they are still disappointed. Is it true that more than a decade is not long enough? If you think carefully about the answer that "the cycle is long and the effect is slow", it is in fact extremely irresponsible nonsense-apart from the possibility of a few people getting rich overnight, which industries have been achieved overnight? If you think carefully about the reasons why agriculture looks beautiful and difficult to do, you will find that "very beautiful" is only a macro imagination or reasoning compared with that of 30 or 40 years ago, with a taste of "Chinese Dream"; "very difficult" is when you plunge into it. Found that it is very bony, very cruel. To put it bluntly, the core problem of the difficulty in agriculture is that the central government's policy on agriculture is always loud and rainy.

Just think about it: in recent years, the central government has issued a lot of policies to support agriculture and benefit agriculture, but how many of them have been really implemented at the grass-roots level?

I have not regarded agriculture as my "primary industry" for two or three years, so I no longer have my previous focus and entanglement. But I am rooted in the countryside, and sometimes I "accidentally" see the article "here is an opportunity for Agriculture" on the Internet or on Wechat. Normally, I should turn a deaf ear to such articles about "here comes the wolf". However, two or three years later, Chinese people have too many expectations for agriculture, so they can't help but go in and have a look. Although the article is a fancy renovation, but the point of view is basically the same old tune-in addition to policy, or policy!

According to common sense, there seems to be no problem with the proposition of "whether the opportunities for agriculture will come or not". Because there is always the best time for an industry or a project to enter, such as the automobile industry, the IT industry and the cultural industry. It is strange that for agriculture, the slogan "here comes the opportunity" has been shouting for more than a decade! According to common sense, it is normal for people from different industry backgrounds to look at the problem from different perspectives and draw different conclusions. Articles such as "the opportunity for Agriculture has come" are basically written by people outside the agricultural circle. Because for people in the agricultural circle, there is no opportunity to discuss, regardless of whether there is a chance or not, what needs to be done. But the strange thing is that when people from different backgrounds talk about agriculture, they all focus on policies. The answer seems to be a high degree of unity, but the results are always poles apart! Why so? What is even more puzzling is that "the opportunity for agriculture" has been called for more than a decade, and no one seems to have interpreted it seriously: has there been an opportunity consistently in agriculture for more than a decade? Or is it that agricultural opportunities have been coming continuously for more than a decade? Or is the opportunity for agriculture for more than a decade coming soon?

To be honest, I'm getting more and more confused.

Until last month, after going back to my hometown to organize Ningxia Tan Sheep Group purchase, I finally found the answer for the "opportunity for agriculture". The idea came from when I complained to the county magistrate about the government's inaction on agriculture with the grievances I brought from the Agriculture Bureau, a thought suddenly came to my mind: am I right? Haven't my brothers and sisters, as well as my parents and grandparents, been working in agriculture without the support of the government? Why would I complain without the support of the government? Is the reason why I do agriculture just to get government support?

The question lingers on buses from the county seat to Yinchuan and planes from Yinchuan to Beijing. I finally figured it out: agriculture does not matter whether there is no opportunity, it is just whether it is suitable or not, agriculture only belongs to people with feelings.

Opportunism is the greatest harm to agriculture

Agriculture is different from the computer, different from the car, different from the film and television play collection, it not only as a commodity attribute, but also plays a fundamental role in the maintenance of life. People can not wear a watch, can not use a computer, can not even wear clothes, but can not eat! It is precisely because agriculture is accompanied by the responsibility and bearing of life, so the choice to engage in agriculture must acquiesce to this responsibility, there is no shirking. However, at present, when people discuss the development opportunities of agriculture in China, they only discuss its economic and commodity attributes, while stripping off the special mission of agriculture. Although there are many "opportunities" for organic agriculture from the perspective of food safety, the so-called opportunities come, in fact, to put it more colloquially, the opportunities to make money. Once the fundamental purpose of agriculture is to make money, it is the root cause of the chaos in China's agriculture.

Now, looking back, it is not difficult to understand the chaos in the clouds and fog that "the opportunity for agriculture has come" every year. Because some people are engaged in the agricultural industry, while others are just speculating to make money; some people produce food, while others only regard food as a commodity. Although they are all "agriculture", the discussion context is different, the understanding of "opportunity" is different, and the outcome is also different. However, returning to the nature of agriculture, since people have to eat every day, the opportunities for agriculture always exist. It will never be as obsolete as 386computers and BP pagers, nor will it come because of "document number one" or a policy. "if you see it, or you don't see it, I'll be there, neither sad nor happy; if you love, or don't love, love will be there, neither increasing nor decreasing." If you have no feelings, you will be disappointed, angry and complain when you can't seize the opportunity. Having no feelings and seizing the opportunity, for agriculture, it is not construction, but destruction or even disaster: first, it hollowed out policies and plundered the welfare of farmers, resulting in pure opportunism; second, it destroyed the ecological balance of agriculture, making agriculture itself into a vicious circle of close to utilitarianism; third, it led to food and food security and self-danger.

Let's start with policy. In retrospect, the so-called "opportunities for agriculture" and other articles refer nothing more than the development opportunities brought about by the central government's policy on agriculture. If the opportunity for real estate comes, the opportunity for new energy comes, and so on, it refers more to the convenience of policy and tax relief. In contrast, the policy support for agriculture is the real money directly transferred to the account. Precisely because it is real gold and silver, it has become the flesh of a group of opportunist Tang monks, and everyone wants to take a bite. As early as 2005, I participated in several topics of rural cooperative economy. Theoretically, Chinese agriculture really needed such an organization, so I thought "the opportunity has come". I took the lead in setting up a cooperative in my hometown and started my career in agricultural entrepreneurship. However, after the promulgation of the Law on Chinese Farmers' Professional Cooperatives in 2007, especially when the media talked a lot about the model of "enterprises + cooperative organizations + farmers", when governments at all levels were making great efforts to "cultivate" their own "leading enterprises", I began to have a foreboding that in the "industrial chain" promoted by this policy, farmers will certainly become a stepping stone for others and will not get any benefit! As a matter of fact, I have roughly counted that in 2008 and 2009, only I could get more than 20 project documents of funds for supporting and benefiting agriculture under various names of the central ministries and commissions, but there is no need to answer how much of this money has really been subsidized to farmers. A classmate who worked in an agriculture-related organization of the central government once criticized me for setting up my own cooperative and farming in person. He didn't understand why I always chose to make money by farming. Their mode of operation is as follows: towards the end of the second half of each year, when various departments begin to formulate and declare projects to support agriculture in the coming year, they will also convene all kinds of "leading enterprises" to hold "closed meetings" in the resorts one after another. According to the policy requirements, "tailor-made" declaration scheme. Then act according to the rules and "catch all the funds in the coming year"! When I was doing research in a certain place, the mayor also pointed to one of the municipal "leading enterprises" present and said, in order to prove his ability to implement the central agriculture-related policies and the support of the local government, that they only need to turn on the machine once a year to get tens of millions of dollars in project funds. This can be said to the point-how many enterprises can easily get policy funds by "turning on once a year" like this! Originally, it was a fund for farmers, but it was grasped by people who saw that "the opportunity for agriculture has come." Those who fail to catch can only get the answer that "agriculture is an industry with a long cycle and slow results" and begin to complain, or embark on a stumbling road of hard work. In the course of this lively discussion about "the opportunity for agriculture has come", where are the farmers?

They don't know anything, and they still work in the city!

Different from the opportunism of obtaining national policy funds as a "profit model", the entry of capital opportunists into agriculture is mainly market-oriented. People with capital in their eyes on agriculture is to pursue the maximization of economic benefits as the fundamental purpose, and has nothing to do with humanities and ecology. They must call it "modern", the law must stress "science", measure the necessary "scale", and take "work hard and get up quickly" as the guiding principle. To sum up, this mainstream road to agricultural industrialization in China is as follows: a group of people who study investment and business models tell you what to do in agriculture; a group of rich, powerful and capricious people who do not understand agriculture go to the countryside to circle the land; under the inducement of interests, the government began to drive farmers upstairs in the name of industrialization or new rural reconstruction. Some experts who have never been in the field but parrot began to teach farmers how to "farm scientifically".... From then on, in the sound of the horn of "document No. 1", the plunder of rural areas, agriculture and farmers was in full swing: pear trees, which had been cut down and planted into grapes, were all cut down to build China's largest "Bordeaux" winery; a small and sophisticated food processing plant with traditional craftsmanship, overnight put out a slogan to strive for the first place in the world. It turns out that the pigs raised by every household for the Spring Festival, under the mode of "enterprises + farmers", the litter of old sows must also produce a "standardized production." As a result, under the guidance of this concept, chickens that had been able to grow trees for seven or eight years and loved to eat worms could only raise their heads and drink water and bow down to eat in modern workshops equipped with temperature, humidity, light, and sound insulation. In his poor 30 days or so of life, there was no sunshine, no flowers, no drizzle. Any tiny sound from the outside world is enough to make these lives die in an instant, and their lives are so fragile that they have to rely on large amounts of antibiotics and hormones to sustain them. Because of the pursuit of profit maximization, chemical fertilizers and ripening agents can be used without a bottom line, and it is hard not to grow crops today; in order to let chickens lay more eggs, they can be exposed to bright light for 24 hours a day; because pigs are found to have no energy consumption as long as they do not move, they will gain much meat, so they are fed with misty drugs and let them sleep and eat. After the predatory mode of production has caused the imbalance of the ecological environment, in order to resist diseases and insect pests, all kinds of highly toxic pesticides dare to be used. The ecological balance of agriculture itself has been completely broken, whether it is cultivated grain and vegetables or farmed cattle, sheep, pigs and chickens, they have all lost the nature of life. "the sedge in the lake has dried up, and there are no birds singing here."

The biggest harm of this mode of agricultural production for the purpose of pursuing profit is that it completely removes the basic attribute of agriculture as food, and only reduces food to a commodity of convertible currency. Because of paying attention to science and efficiency, the chicken that laid one egg a day became two eggs a day; the lamb, which only grew more than 20 jin in three months, fattened up to more than 100 jin in three months; tomatoes, which could be fully ripe in four months, could turn red overnight in order to sell them on the market as soon as possible; red and sweet is the essence of watermelon, but now it is only red but not sweet. Fat and thin is the characteristic of pork, as a result, today's pork is only thin but not fat; driven by interests, garlic can rise from two to ten overnight; mung beans can "play with beans" whenever possible, and ginger can "ginger your army" every day; the day before yesterday, farmers' grapes rotted into piles. People all over the country are flooding abroad to buy milk, while domestic milk can only be poured into the ditch. In such an industrial chain that only cares about seizing opportunities but has no feelings, the interests of farmers are not protected, the ecological environment has been destroyed, industrial laws are unprecedentedly chaotic, food security is in jeopardy, and food safety is in danger.

China's agriculture has entered the era of the last law.

In the public welfare lecture of "Guoxue Health Preservation Culture Hall", which I am in charge of, I have been asked less than once why there are "farmers" in our curriculum. People who ask questions often ask me blankly what "farmers" can say. Every time I encounter this problem, I often ask: among thousands of years of Chinese culture, which culture is older than "agriculture"? Of all the elements of good health, which one is more important than eating? Every time, the questioner and I always end with his "Oh" sound, but at the same time I am brought to a kind of inexplicable sadness. Since when did Chinese people exclude "agriculture" from "Sinology"? Since when has Sinology been stripped down to Confucianism, Buddhism, Taoism and the four Books and five Classics? The reflection of this problem is precisely that: as a country with thousands of years of agricultural civilization, "agriculture" is no longer regarded as a culture that can ascend the hall of elegance; it eats food every day. But people have long forgotten that there is such an industry that is closely related to their lives! This has to be said to be a kind of sadness for the nation that has created the most brilliant agricultural civilization in human history.