Financial leasing alleviates the unbalanced development of farmers' difficulty in purchasing machinery

In recent years, mechanization has played an increasingly important role in China's agricultural modernization. However, due to the shortage of funds in some fields, there are still phenomena that farmers cannot afford. It is urgent to cultivate rural financial market and innovate financial mode to support agricultural mechanization development. Recently, the reporter interviewed Li Weiguo, director of the Agricultural Mechanization Department of the Ministry of Agriculture, on relevant issues.

Reporter: At present, China's agricultural mechanization rate has exceeded 60%, but the development is still very unbalanced. In your opinion, what aspects need to be strengthened?

Li Weiguo: This year, the comprehensive mechanization level of crop cultivation in China is expected to exceed 61%, compared with 59% last year. In the past few years, it has mainly solved the mechanization of cultivation and harvest of some bulk crops, especially grain crops, but there are still some links such as post-production drying mechanization level is relatively low, and the mechanization level of some breeding industries is also relatively low. Therefore, although the agricultural mechanization level of our country has generally reached an intermediate stage, its development is very unbalanced. For example, the comprehensive mechanization rate of wheat has reached more than 90%. Compared with food crops, the mechanization level of cash crops is relatively low, such as cotton, oilseeds and sugar cane. The average mechanization level of the three links of sugarcane cultivation and harvesting is about 40%, but the type of crop is about 20%. The mechanical harvesting has just started, and the area of mechanical harvesting in the whole country is only 100,000 mu.

Therefore, the next step is to continue to promote the mechanization of the whole process of major key crops, such as grain, cotton, oil and sugar; second, efforts should be made to promote the mechanization of other industries such as aquaculture, forestry and fruit industry, primary processing industry, etc. besides planting industry. Some original crop varieties, planting methods and planting agronomy are not matched with mechanized operation. For example, the row spacing of sugarcane planting used to be close planting and narrow row planting. Now the machine operation requires wide and narrow row planting, and the row spacing is required to reach more than 1 meter ~1.2 meters. In this case, it is necessary to speed up the cultivation of some varieties suitable for machine operation and improve cultivation methods as soon as possible.

Reporter: Take sugar cane as an example. If mechanized harvesting does not break through, what impact will it have on the whole industry?

Li Weiguo: Take sugar cane as an example. If mechanization does not break through, our production cost will be too high. Now the labor cost of sugar cane for one mu of land may cost five or six hundred yuan. According to the yield of 5 tons per mu of land, if one ton of sugar cane is cut manually, it is 500 yuan, and if the yield is more than 4 tons, it is more than 400 yuan. The cost of sugarcane mechanical harvesting in foreign countries is about 200 yuan, and some even more than 100 yuan can be collected. This gap is very large. If we do not solve the problem of mechanized sugarcane production, our sugarcane production will have no competitive advantage in terms of cost. More importantly, no one will be willing to engage in such heavy manual labor in the future. If this industry continues for a long time, it will inevitably shrink and withdraw.

Reporter: Mechanization of agricultural production is becoming more and more urgent, but some machinery is expensive, and capital bottleneck has always been a problem. In your opinion, what other ways or means can alleviate this problem besides purchasing subsidies?

Li Weiguo: At present, with the acceleration of industrialization and urbanization in our country and the acceleration of rural labor force transfer speed, there are two trends: one is that the trend of replacing manual operation with machines in agricultural production is becoming more and more obvious, even it can be said that the competitiveness of these industries that cannot replace labor production process with machines is directly affected, and if some industries cannot solve the problem of machine operation for a long time, it may become a historical and cultural heritage. Another trend is that in the development process of agricultural machinery, the development of high-performance, intelligent and specialized large-scale equipment is a trend, which will gradually replace the original simplified, low-performance and single machinery.

This brings a problem, the performance of machinery is getting higher and higher, the price of machinery is getting higher and higher, and there are many agricultural producers and farmers who cannot afford it. Although the state has agricultural machinery purchase subsidies and other support policies, due to the limitation of farmers 'income at this stage, some agricultural machinery equipment still exists that farmers cannot afford to buy, which urgently needs to be solved by innovating agricultural machinery financial service modes and developing diversified financing channels. Developing financial leasing of agricultural machinery is an important solution.

Agricultural machinery financial leasing business in Europe and America has decades of development history. According to the survey of American Equipment Finance and Leasing Association, the annual financial lease amount of agricultural, forestry, animal husbandry and fishery equipment in the United States is as high as 20 billion US dollars. It is a major way for some large farmers, including some medium-sized farmers, to purchase farm equipment in the United States, as well as in some European countries. Buying large-scale agricultural machinery and equipment through financing lease can greatly reduce the pressure of farmers 'one-time investment.

From the perspective of our country, positive exploration has also been carried out in recent years, for example, in Heilongjiang, Xinjiang, and in some other places, financial leasing activities of agricultural machinery have also been carried out. In the past two or three years, there have been some good trends and signs, and some experiences have been explored. Looking at it now, to solve the problem of farmers 'difficulty in purchasing machines, in addition to direct state support, more financial means should be used to solve this problem through financial financing. One of the most important ways is financial leasing.

Reporter: Agricultural financial leasing is how a concept? Li Weiguo: Agricultural machinery financial leasing means that the financial department helps purchasing agricultural machinery according to the needs of customers to solve the financial difficulties of producers. For example, if you need a tractor or a harvester, you don't have the capital but you urgently need it, then you go to a financial leasing institution and buy it according to your wishes and needs. What model, manufacturer and brand do you want to buy? They will help you buy it first. You also have to give a down payment according to a proportion. The equipment you buy belongs to their leasing company first. You sign a contract with them. After a few years, you will pay back their money. And they transfer ownership of the machine to you.

Reporter: What are the forms of agricultural financial leasing? Li Weiguo: There are many forms of financial leasing abroad. The above is the main form, and there are some financial leasing policies issued by agricultural machinery companies. For example, some large-scale agricultural machinery manufacturers, in order to promote their own agricultural machinery products, solve the problem of farmers 'difficulty in purchasing machinery, and provide farmers with a set of financing schemes. You take it first, or you pay me what percentage, and then I rent it to you. After you pay the money two or three years later, I will transfer all the property rights of the machine to you. There are many forms and subjects of foreign financial leasing. China now also has some large-scale agricultural machinery manufacturing enterprises began to explore, such as Futian, Chery, last year began to explore. More are some specialized financial companies doing this work, including Agricultural Bank of China Leasing, including Harbin Bank, and Yixin Leasing Company, which are also doing it, mainly to solve the problem of shortage of funds for farmers to purchase machines and realize mutual benefit and win-win situation among financial enterprises, agricultural machinery enterprises and farmers.