The future opportunity of supply and marketing cooperatives lies in serving the socialization of agriculture.

As an important force in rural economic and social development, supply and marketing cooperatives have been playing an important role in the past 60 years. However, born out of the planned economy, supply and marketing cooperatives are greatly impacted by the market economy. In the past, supply and marketing cooperatives with "many points, wide coverage and long legs" even fell into the situation of "broken nets, broken lines and scattered people" in some places.

In 2014, at the commemoration meeting of the 60th anniversary of the supply and marketing cooperatives, Chinese decision-makers gave instructions, asking them to reposition and play a unique advantage and important role. How to transform into the proposition of the times faced by supply and marketing cooperatives.

This year's Central Committee document No. 1 and the "Government work report" regard this as an important reform task. In April, the State Council approved the implementation of pilot projects in Hebei, Zhejiang, Shandong and Guangdong provinces, with Shandong being the first choice.

After being identified as a pilot province, Shandong Province held a launching ceremony on June 4. Shandong Province has identified 6 cities and 18 counties as pilot projects for the comprehensive reform of supply and marketing cooperatives.

Recently, in the course of Shandong research, a reporter from China Business Daily interviewed Sun Guowei, deputy director of Shandong supply and Marketing Co-operative. He believes that supply and marketing cooperatives are the most qualified to become the main channel of agricultural socialized services, which is the greatest opportunity and development direction for supply and marketing cooperatives in the future.

China Business Daily: as one of the four pilot provinces in the country, Shandong Province officially launched a new round of pilot reform of supply and marketing cooperatives in April this year. Why did you choose Shandong as a pilot?

Sun Guowei: the reason why Shandong was chosen as a pilot project mainly lies in three aspects. First, the grass-roots organizational system of Shandong supply and marketing cooperatives is relatively complete, the management network is relatively sound, and it has a good foundation for serving farmers; second, Shandong supply and marketing cooperatives take land trusteeship as a starting point to promote large-scale agricultural services. this has attracted the attention of the Central Committee and the head office; third, the Shandong provincial government has given strong support in terms of policy.

Daily: in the field of deepening reform, what kind of exploration is being carried out by Shandong supply and marketing cooperatives? How to evaluate such an exploration?

Sun Guowei: after being identified as a comprehensive reform pilot province this year, the provincial agency has selected 6 cities and 18 counties as pilot units, of which 10 counties and districts have been selected to carry out special trials of new rural cooperative finance. This pilot project focuses on seeking breakthroughs in four aspects: system and mechanism reform, large-scale service, circulation modernization and rural cooperative finance.

Functionally, the supply and marketing cooperative is a new type of cooperative economic organization system. This requires supply and marketing cooperatives to vigorously develop and lead farmers' cooperatives and their associated cooperatives, and expand the rural coverage of grass-roots organizations in a variety of ways.

The focus of this deepening reform is to serve agriculture on a large scale and to turn supply and marketing cooperatives into the main channel of agricultural socialization services. Agricultural social services include "babysitter" full escrow and "menu" semi-escrow. It is up to the farmers to choose which one to choose. This kind of trusteeship mainly revolves around the key links such as agricultural material supply, agricultural machinery operation, unified prevention and control, processing and circulation of agricultural products, and so on.

In the work promotion mechanism, the provincial cooperatives spare no effort to promote the "four in one" and actively guide farmers' cooperatives and credit mutual aid organizations to cooperate closely with the village "two committees" to provide a joint force for agricultural and rural development. focus on solving the current problems in agricultural development, such as service, organization, management and financial guarantee.

Of course, supply and marketing cooperatives are rooted in rural areas and have the advantages of "many points, wide coverage and long legs". This time, it is necessary to upgrade the modernization level of the circulation network of supply and marketing cooperatives and build a provincial e-commerce network platform. Cultivate and develop large-scale modern circulation enterprises with core competitiveness.

In view of the difficulty of farmers' loans, one of the highlights of this deepening reform is the development of cooperative finance. On the basis of further standardizing the credit mutual aid business within farmers' cooperatives, farmers' cooperatives with democratic management, standardized operation and strong driving force are selected to apply for the establishment of farmers' credit mutual aid cooperatives.

Daily News: Shandong is a major agricultural province. In the new historical period, facing the new challenges in the field of agriculture, rural areas and farmers, where are the opportunities for supply and marketing cooperatives in the future? How to make a good self-positioning?

Sun Guowei: China has a large population and little land. This national condition will still exist for a long time. Agricultural production can only be managed on a moderate scale. Therefore, it is necessary to improve the socialized service system of agriculture and make up for the lack of production scale with the scale of service.

Generally speaking, there are many subjects who provide social services for farmers, but these subjects are generally scattered, the scale is small, and the service function is relatively weak. Because of the advantages of the supply and marketing cooperative system, sound organizational system, deep mass foundation, and both business and public welfare, supply and marketing cooperatives are the most qualified to become the main channel of agricultural socialization service. This is the greatest opportunity and development direction for supply and marketing cooperatives in the future.

As for positioning, in May this year, the central government made it clear that supply and marketing cooperatives are an important position for governments at all levels to promote the work of agriculture, rural areas and farmers in the form of cooperative economic organizations. To carry out the pilot project of comprehensive reform of supply and marketing cooperatives is to become a new force and comprehensive platform to serve the production and life of farmers through comprehensively deepening the reform.