Five aspects to improve the ability of food and food security in China

Researcher Li Wei, director of the Development Research Center of the State Council, recently attended the fourth China Food and Food Security Strategy Summit jointly sponsored by the China Economic Annual Society and the China Rural Research Institute of Tsinghua University. the main contradiction between China's food and food security has changed from a total shortage to a structural contradiction, and it is facing severe challenges to continue to improve China's food and food security capacity under the new situation. The fundamental way to solve the contradiction is to promote the supply-side structural reform of agriculture and improve the market competitiveness and sustainable development ability of agriculture. He put forward five reform measures.

Li Wei pointed out that food and food safety are livelihood issues of great concern to the whole society, and they are also an important cornerstone of economic development and social stability. Through long-term efforts, China has made great achievements in ensuring food and food security beyond its own stage of economic development. Not long ago, the British Economist Intelligence Unit released the Global Food Security Index report, which is measured by 28 qualitative and quantitative indicators in terms of food price affordability, food supply capacity, and quality and safety assurance capacity. China ranked 42nd in the global food security index in 2015. This is well ahead of China's ranking in the global per capita GDP ranking.

Li Wei said: at present, the supply of all kinds of food in China's grain market is adequate and prices are stable, and the main contradiction between China's food and food security has changed from a total shortage to a structural contradiction. Under the new situation, continuing to improve China's food and food security capacity is still facing severe challenges.

From the perspective of product structure, the problem of the coexistence of inventory backlog and import growth has become increasingly prominent. At present, the total supply of agricultural products in China is abundant, but the development of high-quality, diversified and specialized agricultural products lags behind, and the prices at home and abroad are seriously upside down, resulting in the coexistence of excessive inventory of some products and the rapid growth of imports of some products at the same time. It is estimated that in 2015, China's grain output was 620 million tons, consumption was about 650 million tons, and the gap to be made up by imports was about 30 million tons. However, in 2015, China's actual grain imports reached 130 million tons. The reason for the excess import of 100 million tons lies in the insufficient domestic production of soybeans which are in great demand in China, the high price of domestic corn and the large imports of corn substitutes such as sorghum and barley driven by the price difference. The result of excessive imports is the rapid increase of domestic grain stocks, especially the problem of corn and rice stocks purchased by the state. The coexistence of inventory backlog and import growth reflects that the improvement of the quality of agricultural products can not keep up with the continuous improvement of consumers' demand for quality, and the adjustment of agricultural production structure can not keep up with the integration of domestic and foreign agricultural products markets and the change of agricultural comparative advantage.

From the perspective of capacity structure, there is a large number of marginal capacity that needs to be withdrawn. At present, a large number of China's total agricultural production capacity is acquired at the cost of overdraft resources and sacrificing the ecological environment, which is the marginal production capacity of agriculture. Such as excessive use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides, long-term over-exploitation of groundwater, and the use of heavy metal contaminated cultivated land to grow grain and vegetables, agricultural film residual soil and so on. Although these production practices increase current production, they are obtained at the expense of the development foundation of future generations. These losses outweigh the gain and need to be resolutely withdrawn.

From the perspective of the main structure of operation, the proportion of scale operation needs to be improved urgently. Too small operation scale not only leads to low agricultural labor productivity, but also affects the quality supervision in the field of food processing and management. In agricultural production, although the turnover rate of cultivated land has reached 33%, most of them are sporadic transfers among farmers, and small-scale farmers still occupy an absolutely dominant position. the main body of moderate-scale operation, such as family farms, farmers' cooperatives and agricultural modern enterprises, has just started, and its proportion in agricultural production is still very low. In this pattern of agricultural management, it is difficult to improve the level of standardization of agricultural production, and it is difficult to ensure the quality and safety of agricultural products from the source. In the process of food processing and management, there are more than 400,000 food production enterprises, more than 3 million food operators, and countless small workshops and vendors in China. The degree of market concentration is very low, and there is a lack of large enterprises and brands. It greatly increases the difficulty of supervision.

Li Wei stressed that the fundamental way to deal with these challenges is to promote agricultural supply-side structural reform and improve the market competitiveness and sustainable development ability of agriculture. In the process of agricultural modernization, the core of strengthening supply-side structural reform and improving the ability of food and food security is to do a good job of the following points.

First, speed up the elimination of inventory by market-oriented means. The root cause of the formation of the inventory of staple agricultural products such as grain, cotton, oil and sugar lies in that the purchase price of supporting the market carries multiple policy objectives such as income, output and market, which is higher than the market equilibrium price for a long time, so it is difficult to compete with imported products and sell out of the warehouse at a reasonable price. This not only increases the financial burden, but also restricts the healthy development of the whole industrial chain. To solve this problem, we must reform the price formation mechanism of agricultural products and the collection and storage system, and give full play to the regulatory role of the market. The general direction is "market pricing and price compensation separation", through "market pricing" to promote the adjustment of planting structure and the development of downstream industries, and through "price compensation separation" to ensure that farmers' income can be basically stable in the transitional period. In the long run, China's agricultural support policy system also needs to be adjusted and improved, gradually reducing market price support for agricultural products, and increasing investment in general services such as infrastructure construction, agricultural scientific research and extension, so as to leave more room for the market.

Second, to enhance the competitiveness of agriculture with appropriate scale operation. The development of various forms of appropriate scale operation of agriculture is the inevitable requirement to deal with the changes of urban and rural population structure, the conglomeration of agriculture, the aging of farmers and the hollowing out of rural areas. it is also the fundamental way to improve agricultural labor productivity, control the rapid rise in labor costs of agricultural products, and enhance the basic competitiveness of China's agriculture. It is necessary to promote the reform of "separation of rights", speed up the registration and issuance of rural contracted land rights, explore the registration and issuance of rural contracted land management rights obtained through circulation, and find a balance between safeguarding the rights and interests of contractors and operators. We will speed up the construction of a policy system for cultivating new types of agricultural operators, and vigorously develop family farms, farmers' cooperatives and agricultural enterprises. Agricultural economies of scale are reflected not only in the field of production, but also in the field of services. it is necessary to expand the pilot scope of socialized service innovation in the whole process of agricultural production and the government's purchase of public welfare service mechanism. we will promote the specialization, scale and socialization of services such as substitute farming and seed generation, unified prevention and control of diseases and insect pests.

Third, replace the withdrawal of marginal capacity with the growth of green capacity. In order to promote the orderly withdrawal of agricultural marginal production capacity, we must find the right fulcrum, especially to internalize the negative external effects, so that those who adopt this mode of production will pay the price and have pressure to withdraw. At the same time, we should make use of the current favorable opportunity of abundant agricultural products to speed up the conversion of farmland to forests, wet land and beaches, and expand the intensity of rotation and fallow in areas such as over-exploitation of groundwater and heavy metal pollution, and the state can give certain subsidies to farmers in these places. It is necessary to improve green, healthy and efficient production capacity so that it can take over or even outperform the withdrawal of marginal capacity. To this end, it is necessary to implement the strategy of "storing grain in the land and storing grain in technology". We will vigorously promote the progress of agricultural science and technology, speed up the upgrading of a new round of varieties of major food crops, and increase the contribution rate of agricultural scientific and technological progress to 60% by 2020.

Fourth, to improve the level of food quality and safety by strict supervision. This is not only the urgent need to protect and improve people's livelihood, but also the only way to enhance consumer confidence and expand the market space for agricultural products. Practice shows that, in the face of strict quality standards, China's agriculture has sufficient resilience and adaptability. The key lies in strict law enforcement and strict supervision.

Fifth, improve the efficiency of agricultural resources allocation in the process of opening to the outside world. An important starting point of agricultural supply-side structural reform is to improve the efficiency of agricultural resource allocation. Under the background of building a new open economic system, to improve the efficiency of the allocation of agricultural resources, we should not only be based on the domestic market, but should look at the whole world, and truly make overall use of two kinds of resources in both domestic and foreign markets. On the one hand, it is necessary to scientifically determine the level of self-sufficiency of major agricultural products and rationally arrange the priority of agricultural industry development. To adjust the agricultural production structure in accordance with the principle of comparative advantage, speed up the pace of agricultural transformation and upgrading, and enhance agricultural competitiveness, it is necessary to continue to consolidate and give full play to China's industrial advantages in the fields of fruits and vegetables, tea, and aquatic products, and expand the export of superior agricultural products. to increase farmers' income in export production areas. On the other hand, we should take into account such factors as the endowment of global agricultural resources, the supply and demand pattern of agricultural products, and the investment policy environment, determine the layout of opening up by region, country, industry, and product, and promote the diversification of import sources. we will speed up the formation of win-win and stable economic and trade relations. In particular, it is necessary to strengthen cooperation with countries along the "Belt and Road Initiative" route in the fields of agricultural investment, trade, technology and production capacity.