The backbone peasants are the new force supporting the countryside

Reform and opening up, especially after Deng Xiaoping's southern tour, the export-oriented development strategy and the practice of socialist market economy have brought great changes to China's social structure.

As far as the general agricultural areas are concerned, the biggest change in rural areas is that a large number of young and middle-aged farmers go to cities to work and do business. It is common in rural areas that middle-aged and elderly parents stay in the village to work, while young children go to work in cities.

In the rural areas of the central and western regions, farmers in the cities no longer cultivate their own contracted land, but transfer the land to the young and middle-aged couples who still stay in the village for farming, forming a moderate scale operation. The income of these couples comes from the village, the social relations are in the village, and they maintain a complete family life, which is what we call the "middle peasants". In the sense of social structure, the "middle peasants" are the backbone of staying in rural areas and the "backbone farmers".

Judging from the current situation in rural areas across the country, the proportion of "middle peasants" in all peasant households is small, and the proportion in different parts of the country is about 10% to 20%. In terms of time, economic development and urban expansion provide opportunities for more and more migrant workers to live in cities, and more and more farmers' families will go to the city and flow out the right to use the contracted land, so that more "middle farmers" can be formed in rural areas.

These "middle peasants" who flow into the land can get no less than the income of migrant workers from agriculture because they have a certain scale of operation. They began to equip agricultural machinery, pay attention to new agricultural technologies, and consider low input and high output, so they have different agricultural management character and agricultural management model from small-scale operation. Farmers of this scale will pay more attention to the conditions of production infrastructure, are more willing to organize the construction of irrigation channels and machine tillage roads, and have more motivation to undertake all kinds of resources from top to bottom to the countryside. They are active absorbers of new agricultural technology, active promoters of rural infrastructure construction, and the best candidates for village group cadres and villagers' representatives. They are in the prime of life, have a good income, have a good social status, and feel good about themselves. They are the builders with the most vigor and vitality under the background of the outflow of rural people and property.

The emergence of "backbone farmers" is a very unique phenomenon under the background of Chinese farmers going to cities. The rise of the "backbone farmers" has changed the imagination that only the outflow of rural people's property may bring about the crisis and decline of the rural society, and makes the rural society have a new and vibrant force. This is the reason why the rural society is still stable under the background of the outflow of people and property in rural areas.

The spontaneous formation of middle peasants is a new force worthy of attention in the current rural social structure. The rise of the middle peasants will become an important phenomenon in a long historical period after entering the 21st century. The study of the formation mechanism, structure and role of middle peasants in agricultural production and social governance will become a rich mine for policy and academic research.

At present, some local governments promote the transfer of land to industrial and commercial capital, resulting in the elimination not only of agriculture for the elderly, but also of the "backbone farmers". The rural areas are more and more divided into a structure opposed by a very small number of foreign industrial and commercial capital and most of the old, weak, sick and disabled who are unable to enter the city but have no agricultural services. in this way, the order of the village will be difficult to maintain.