The reform of state-owned forest farms should pay close attention to ecological forestry and people's livelihood forestry.

This year is the first year of China's comprehensive deepening reform. Forestry reform involves all aspects, but the reform of state-owned forest farms is obviously the top priority.

Zhao Shucong, director of the State Forestry Administration, stressed at the meeting of directors of the National Forestry Department held at the beginning of the year that this year we should concentrate on drafting and completing the reform plan for state-owned forest farms and strive to fully launch the reform of state-owned forest farms.

In order to promote the reform of state-owned forest farms, the State Forestry Administration has made intensive preparations. In August last year, the long-awaited pilot reform of state-owned forest farms has been launched. At present, through the joint efforts of many parties, the reform plan of state-owned forest farms nationwide has been drafted.

August 19 - 26, to reform the state-owned forest farms as the theme of the "2014 county forestry director training course" was held in Beijing. The training course specially invited relevant experts and leaders of the core ministries and commissions responsible for the top-level design of state-owned forest farm reform, such as the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Human Resources and social protection and the State Forestry Administration, to interact with the trainees on policies related to the reform of state-owned forest farms.

Protect the ecology and safeguard the ecological security of the land

"The head funds of state-owned forest farms, ecological protection funds and necessary work funds shall be included in the county-level financial budget." Liu Weixiang, director of Longhui County Forestry Bureau of Hunan Province, suggested that state-owned forest farms must be included in government financial guarantee in the reform, and subsidies for public welfare forests, forest planting investment and forest tending should be increased in order to speed up the cultivation and protection of forest resources.

"The key is to strengthen the top-level design, strengthen the main responsibility of the government, and then realize the reform goal of expanding forest resources and enhancing functions of state-owned forest farms." Zhang Chenggang, deputy director of Chengde City Forestry Bureau of Hebei Province, also expressed his view of attaching importance to ecological protection in the reform, suggesting that the state increase capital investment and issue financial support policies to strengthen resource management.

State-owned forest farm is a forestry institution specialized in afforestation and forest management established by the state in the barren hills and wasteland suitable for state-owned forests in the early days of the founding of new china. However, with the continuous development of market economy and the adjustment of forestry development policies, the development of state-owned forest farm gradually fell into the situation of resource exhaustion and economic crisis.

"The positioning of ecological public welfare function of state-owned forest farm has been widely recognized by the whole society, and it is the basic skeleton of ecological security barrier of our country's territory." State Forestry Administration state-owned forest farms and forest seedling work station chief director Yang Chao introduced, 4855 state-owned forest farms nationwide total operating area of 1.15 billion mu, accounting for 8% of China's land area, of which forest land area, forest area and forest stock, respectively accounted for 19%,23% and 17% of the corresponding share of the country.

"Of these 4855 forest farms, 1312 have been listed as natural forest resources protection projects, 1058 as 'three-north' shelterbelt projects, 359 as 'long shelterbelt' projects and 165 as coastal shelterbelt projects." Yang Chao further stressed,"It can be seen that the reform of state-owned forest farms is related to the quality of ecological civilization construction, and is an important measure to protect and improve forest ecological functions and safeguard ecological security of the land."

Fan Fangyan, Deputy Director of Forestry Bureau of Tai 'an City of Shandong Province, and Liu Zhusheng, Deputy Director of Forestry Bureau of Jiujiang City of Jiangxi Province, also expressed the same view. They hoped that the state would reasonably define the attribute of forest farm in the reform of state-owned forest farm, promote the separation of government affairs and enterprises, clarify the responsibility of power, implement financial support policy, strengthen the construction of forest fire prevention system, innovate the conservation mechanism of public welfare forest based on purchase service, and crack down severely on the destruction of forest resources.

Benefit people's livelihood and improve employee happiness index

Wuyi County is the vanguard of the reform of state-owned forest farms in Zhejiang Province. From 2004 to 2009, the forest farms owed an average of 1.237 million yuan of salary funds annually. However, after implementing social security trusteeship for retired employees in 2009, they achieved balance of payments for the first time in the following year. Zhu Jiyue, director of the county forestry bureau, said that special attention should be paid to protecting the rights and interests of employees in the reform. Only when the people are stable can the reform succeed.

Since Jiujiang City of Jiangxi Province started the renovation of dilapidated houses in state-owned forest farms in 2010, government departments at all levels have actively implemented policies such as tax reduction and exemption, free allocation of construction land, etc., gradually realizing the "dream of living in peace" of forest farm employees. Lu Zhusheng said that the reform of state-owned forest farms should do everything possible to give warmth to employees. A warm home is a strong backing for a person.

There are 750,000 employees in China's state-owned forest farms. Due to the constraints of institutional mechanisms and relevant national policies, the state-owned forest farms that have adhered to the principle of "managing slopes first, then managing nests, first producing and then living" for many years have shown the characteristics of "no city, no countryside, no work, no enterprise" in recent years. The infrastructure is backward and the livelihood problems are prominent. Among them, there are 486 forest farms without roads, 575 without telephones, 170 without electricity, and 1575 with drinking water safety and draught difficulties. In 2013, the per capita annual income of on-the-job employees in forest farms was 18,000 yuan, only 35.3% of the per capita annual income of urban employees nationwide. In addition, 22.5% of the total number of on-the-job employees did not participate in basic old-age insurance, and 30.6% did not participate in basic medical insurance.

"Protecting forest ecology and ensuring workers 'lives are the two major goals of the reform of state-owned forest farms." Yang Chao said that in the reform of state-owned forest farms, special attention should be paid to improving the employment transfer mechanism and social protection mechanism for employees, and compulsory buy-out of seniority should never be adopted, and one-off layoffs should not be made.

"Proper placement of workers is one of the main tasks of the reform of state-owned forest farms." Liu Chunyan, deputy director of the State-owned Forest Farm and Forest Seedling Work Station of the State Forestry Administration, said,"The majority of state-owned forest farm workers have dedicated their youth to the national ecological construction and have raised the backbone of China's ecological construction." In this reform, according to the principle of fairness and justice, we should properly arrange employees and ensure full employment. In principle, surplus employees should be properly arranged in forest farms through forest tending and management, forest resource management and other methods. Some people aged 40 to 50 should retire early according to national policies."

On April 3, 2013, Vice Premier Wang Yang visited the State Forestry Administration for investigation and pointed out that the staff of state-owned forest areas and forest farms have made great contributions to the development of the country. Special research should be carried out, special attention should be paid, and effective measures should be taken to comprehensively improve the production and living conditions of forest areas so that the forest farmers and forestry workers can live a better life.

Strong team, give strength to modern forestry development

"Understanding talent is great knowledge, gathering talent is great ability, and using talent is great wisdom." General Secretary Xi Jinping has repeatedly stressed the need to cultivate, attract, respect and care for talents.

The reform of state-owned forest farms is no exception. Ding Lixin, deputy director of the Personnel Department of the State Forestry Administration, said that the training course for prefectural and county forestry directors in 2014 was held to strengthen the construction of grass-roots forestry leading cadres and comprehensively improve the policy level and ability of directors of grass-roots forestry bureaus to promote the reform of state-owned forest farms, so as to better promote the development of ecological forestry and livelihood forestry.

"Through learning, I have broadened my horizons, increased my knowledge, and exchanged experiences." Ai Yanjun, monitor of the training class and director of Yongzhou City Forestry Bureau of Hunan Province, said that the training made everyone feel that the construction of five professional teams was very important and urgent in the reform and development of state-owned forest farms.

Zhang Chenggang felt the same way. He proposed that we should strengthen the construction of scientific and technological talents and the transformation and application and popularization of scientific and technological achievements, and the reasonable structure and excellent quality of talents are the important support for the development of forestry science and technology.

"The construction of five teams of forest farm workers is the fundamental force to protect ecology and benefit people's livelihood." In the process of reform of state-owned forest farms, Yang Chao believes that we should actively attach importance to introducing high-level talents and practical talents urgently needed for reform and development, cultivate business backbones, strengthen talent training, improve the quality of employees, expand space for economic development, guarantee people's livelihood and well-being, demonstrate scientific and technological progress, and give impetus to the development of modern forestry.

It is understood that the trainees of this training class are mainly from Hebei, Zhejiang, Anhui, Jiangxi, Shandong, Hunan and Gansu seven pilot provinces of state-owned forest farm reform as well as Fujian, Guizhou, Xinjiang and other provinces with high reform enthusiasm. They have been working in the front line of forestry reform and development for a long time and are the direct executors of implementing the national forestry strategic deployment and promoting forestry reform.