Opportunities and challenges for the development of agriculture, rural areas and farmers under the new normal

At present, China's economic development has entered a new normal, which is changing from high-speed growth to medium-to-high-speed growth. How to continue to strengthen the basic position of agriculture and promote the continuous increase of farmers' income under the background of slowing economic growth is a major issue that must be solved. The change of social structure, the reduction of rural surplus labor force, the aging of population, environmental deterioration and excess capacity all put forward new requirements for the work of agriculture, rural areas and farmers. What kind of impact will the new economic normal have on the development of agriculture, rural areas and farmers? How to deal with it? This issue of the dialogue program has an exclusive interview with Ye Xingqing, head of the Rural Department of the Development Research Center of the State Council.

Moderator: our reporter Zhang Weibin

Guest: Ye Xingqing, head of the Rural Department of the Development Research Center of the State Council.

Ye Xingqing, minister and researcher of the Rural Economic Research Department of the Development Research Center of the State Council, is also the vice chairman of the China Forestry Economic Society, the executive director of the China Agricultural Economic Society, and a member of the academic Committee of the China Rural Research Institute of Tsinghua University. has been engaged in the theory and policy research of agriculture, rural areas and farmers for a long time.

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New Strategy of Food Security: ensuring Grain production capacity and reforming Price system

Moderator: what are the new changes in the new national food security strategy under the new normal?

Guests: the new national food security strategy of "taking us as the priority, based at home, ensuring production capacity, moderate import, and scientific and technological support" has not only maintained the necessary stability, continuity, but also new development.

The scope of "insurance" has shrunk. According to traditional grain statistics, China's grain self-sufficiency rate has dropped to 88.7% in 2013, but this is mainly caused by the rapid growth of soybean imports. Continuing to use wide-caliber calculation of grain self-sufficiency rate, including grains, legumes and potatoes, is neither in line with international practice, nor in line with the actual situation of China's food security work. The shift from a general requirement for basic self-sufficiency in grain to "basic self-sufficiency in grain and absolute safety in food rations" is conducive to the concentration of resources to maintain key points.

The requirements of "insurance" have been improved. "ensuring production capacity" is the most important basis for ensuring national food security. But this capacity should be healthy and sustainable. To this end, the central authorities have clearly put forward two new requirements: one is to attach equal importance to both quantity and quality, and the other is to be based on the present and give consideration to the long term. In the future production of cereals and other agricultural products, we should pay more attention to quality and safety, source control and supervision of the whole process of production and marketing.

The way of "protection" has changed. For the first time, "moderate import" is proposed as an important part of the food security strategy. While increasing domestic production capacity, actively participating in international trade and opening up a wide range of grain import channels will make China's grain supply more reliable and the market more stable.

The responsibility of "insurance" has been adjusted. In the context of the new era, the boundaries of government and market, central and local governments need to be redivided. It is clear that the central and local governments are jointly responsible, and the central government bears the primary responsibility, and local governments at all levels should establish a sense of the overall situation, increase investment in grain production, and consciously assume responsibility for safeguarding national food security. This is conducive to the formation of a unified grain market throughout the country.

Moderator: in the face of the new situation and strategic adjustment, what are the main reform tasks to do a good job in food security?

Guests: it should be normal for grain prices to be formed by market supply and demand, but the policy practice in the past deviated from this original intention: the range of varieties for implementing the minimum purchase price and temporary purchase and storage policy has been continuously broadened, and the frequency of market-supporting acquisitions is getting higher and higher. the proportion of market-supporting acquisitions in market circulation is too large. This kind of policy practice has played an important role in arousing farmers' enthusiasm for production, but the impact on the mismatch of agricultural resources can not be ignored. Although the domestic price of agricultural products exceeds the price after import tax on shore is an inevitable trend, the inflection point of domestic and foreign agricultural products prices upside down will come sooner or later, but the market purchase policy makes this inflection point come earlier. In the face of this dilemma, it is necessary to reform the minimum purchase price and temporary purchase and storage system, that is, to gradually establish the target price system of agricultural products in accordance with the principle of "separation of price and compensation and market pricing".

The correct way to realize national food security is to let the correct market signal allocate agricultural resources and determine the grain production capacity by the correct market signal. For this reason, it is necessary to reform the price formation mechanism of grain and other agricultural products.

In the long run, cotton and soybean are suitable for the reform operation that is not linked to production behavior and subsidizes the price difference according to the acreage or yield of a fixed year. When the lowest purchase price of major grain varieties with higher self-sufficiency requirements, such as rice and wheat, exceeds the after-shore tax price calculated at the additional tax rate, the price difference can be supplied to farmers according to the actual output or acreage of the current year, which can be linked to production behavior.

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To meet the challenge, it is necessary to change the mode of agricultural development.

Moderator: in the context of the current economic new normal, what are the main challenges facing China's agricultural development?

Guests: China's agriculture faces five major challenges, including how to get out of the embarrassing situation of "policy city", how to withdraw from "unhealthy" production capacity in an orderly manner, and how to break through the dilemma of "standing tall". How to adapt to the new normal of "long-term deficit" in agricultural trade, and how to prevent the risk of falling into the "transfer deadlock" of agricultural land.

The first challenge has already been mentioned in the analysis of food issues. The second challenge is that a considerable part of the current agricultural production capacity is acquired at the expense of the ecological environment, "eating our children and grandchildren" and overdrawing in the future. It is specifically shown in the following five aspects: first, the production capacity at the cost of excessive use of modern inputs. The second is the production capacity acquired at the cost of seriously over-exploiting groundwater. The third is the production capacity at the cost of encroaching on wetlands. Fourth, the production capacity at the cost of serious soil and water loss. Fifth, the production capacity at the cost of the use of contaminated soil and affecting food quality and safety. The third challenge is how to scientifically determine the self-sufficiency level of major agricultural products and reasonably arrange the priority of agricultural industry development under the constraints of "price ceiling" and "yellow box subsidy" and rising production costs. Since 2004, there has been a continuous deficit in the trade of agricultural products, and the deficit is getting larger and larger, and the overall self-sufficiency rate of agricultural products has entered a downward channel, which will have a fundamental impact on the pattern of agricultural resource allocation in China. The fifth challenge is that with the increasing power of contracting rights, the impact on the transformation of agricultural land transfer and small-scale peasant management in China remains to be seen.