Central Rural work Conference: strengthening supply-side Reform how can farmers achieve a double increase in output and income?

The two-day 2015 Central Rural work Conference concluded on the 25th, which summarized the work of agriculture, rural areas and farmers during the 12th five-year Plan period, analyzed the current agricultural and rural situation, and deployed agricultural and rural work during 2016 and the 13th five-year Plan period. Before the meeting, General Secretary Xi Jinping gave important instructions on doing a good job in the work of agriculture, rural areas and farmers. Premier Li Keqiang gave instructions.

Thanks to the central policy, in the new millennium, twelve central government documents have paid attention to "agriculture, rural areas and farmers", and both central and local finance have given strong support to agriculture. By this year, China has achieved 12 consecutive increases in total grain output, spanning three five-year plans, with a frequency comparable to that issued by the Central No.1 document.

It is worth noting that the National Agricultural work Conference was held at the same time as the Central Rural work Conference, which pointed out that during the 13th five-year Plan period, "six periods are the same"-- the decisive period of building a well-off society in rural areas in an all-round way, the key period of consolidating the good situation in agricultural and rural areas, the transformation period of agricultural development mode, the climbing period of promoting agricultural competitiveness, the period of comprehensively deepening rural reform, and the deepening period of promoting urban-rural integration.

At the end of the 12th five-year Plan, China has reached a critical period of accelerating the transformation from traditional agriculture to modern agriculture.

The orientation of the most important issues concerning agriculture, rural areas and farmers

The central government has always attached great importance to the issue of agriculture, rural areas and farmers, and the previous government put it in the position of "the top priority of the work of the whole party". The current government has been consistent with it and mentioned this argument again. With regard to the work of "agriculture, rural areas and farmers," General Secretary Xi Jinping stressed in his instructions that attaching importance to agriculture and consolidating the foundation is the foundation for the well-being of the people. During the 13th five-year Plan period, we must persist in solving the problems of agriculture, rural areas and farmers as the top priority of the work of the whole party.

Summing up the 12th five-year Plan period, General Secretary Xi Jinping commented, "during the 12th five-year Plan period, China's agricultural and rural development has achieved fruitful results, which has played an important role in winning the overall work." At the same time, it must be noted that there are still many problems and challenges facing China's agricultural and rural development, and the work of agriculture, rural areas and farmers should not be ignored and relaxed at any time. "

As 2016 is the first year of the 13th five-year Plan, rural work will be carried out around the plan next year. Therefore, the meeting stressed that during the 13th five-year Plan period, we should firmly establish and earnestly implement the development concept of innovation, coordination, green, openness and sharing, strengthen efforts to strengthen farmers and benefit rich farmers, and further promote various reforms in rural areas. solve the difficult problems of agriculture, rural areas and farmers, strengthen the driving force for innovation, plant development advantages, actively promote agricultural modernization, do a solid job in poverty alleviation and development, and improve the level of building a new socialist countryside. Let agriculture and rural areas become a vast world where great achievements can be made.

Li Qiang, chairman and chief analyst of Shanghai Huiyi Consulting Co., Ltd., analyzed to China Business Daily that agriculture is a basic industry, and whether in history or at present, the idea of strengthening the foundation and consolidating the foundation should not be changed. and the memory of food shortages in the past made the ruling party have to consider attaching importance to grain production and pursuing a bumper harvest. "Don't panic when you have grain in your hand," and Lian Zeng, which continues until this year, is based on this logic. However, the background of the current economic conditions has changed, and the new concept of food security needs to change from simply pursuing quantity to paying attention to the quality of agricultural products, improving agricultural production efficiency and improving agricultural ecological environment while ensuring quantitative stability.

Li Qiang said that the new concept of food security has four points, quantity, quality, efficiency, and ecology. This is consistent with supply-side structural reform. Structural reform is to solve the problem of improving the quality and efficiency of the agricultural supply system, so as to realize agricultural modernization, but this is a medium-and long-term task for the next five years or more. In the short term, the serious challenges we are facing are the growing problem of huge grain stocks, as well as the price formation mechanism and storage policies of important agricultural products such as grain, as well as the mechanism for increasing farmers' income.

In his instruction, Premier Li Keqiang pointed out: during the 13th five-year Plan period, we should pay attention to analyzing the new situation after the bumper grain harvest and take targeted measures to continue to arouse the enthusiasm of farmers to develop modern agriculture.

Li Qiang analyzed that new situations emerged after a bumper grain harvest, including bumper grain harvests but no increase in farmers' incomes, unsustainable agricultural production capacity at the cost of overdraft of the ecological environment, and so on.

At the end of October this year, our reporter conducted a survey in a number of major grain-producing counties in southern Henan and found that it was difficult for farmers to sell grain this year, not only because the quality of wheat was not up to standard, but also because of the sharp drop in corn prices, resulting in high agricultural yields but no increase in income. Behind the price drop, there is an urgent need to adjust the domestic minimum purchase price policy and temporary purchase and storage policy, because the implementation cost of these policies is too high, manifested by excessive financial and inventory pressure. and the promotion of widening the difference in grain prices at home and abroad.

Agricultural supply-side structural reform

After summing up the achievements of "agriculture, rural areas and farmers" during the 12th five-year Plan period, the meeting pointed out that during the 13th five-year Plan period, agricultural and rural work should firmly establish a strong sense of weakness and adhere to problem orientation. we should earnestly lengthen the short legs of agriculture, the synchronization of the four modernizations, and make up for the shortcomings of the rural areas in an all-round way.

By the end of the 13th five-year Plan in 2020, this year is also the time point for the first centenary goal of "building a moderately prosperous society in an all-round way" set by the central government. In the historical period of "six periods with the same arrival", agriculture, as the deficiency of "the synchronization of the four modernizations", especially needs to accelerate the modernization.

Dr. Wang Yuxin of Guilin Institute of Aerospace Technology told China Business Daily that the most direct reason for the central authorities'"top priority" judgment made by comprehensively considering various factors is that if China wants to be strong, agriculture must be strong, and rural areas must be rich. Communist Party of China, as the ruling party, wants to fulfill the political promise of enabling the people to live a better life, then during the 13th five-year Plan period, we must lengthen the short leg of agriculture, promote industrial upgrading, make up for this deficiency in rural areas, and expand effective supply. These things should be done sooner or later, early to do, early to achieve results, early to benefit.

On November 10 this year, General Secretary Xi Jinping proposed to strengthen supply-side structural reform while moderately expanding aggregate demand at the meeting of the Central Financial and Economic leading Group. When presiding over the working meeting on the preparation of the 13th five-year Plan outline on the 17th, Premier Li Keqiang once again stressed that efforts should be made to promote the industry to the middle and high end on both the supply side and the demand side.

The economic term "supply-side reform" has attracted academic attention.

The Central Economic work Conference held a few days ago mentioned that to stabilize economic growth, we should pay more attention to supply-side structural reform, and put forward five major tasks: eliminating production capacity, removing inventory, deleveraging, reducing costs, and making up for deficiencies next year. At this central rural work conference, it was stressed that efforts should be made to strengthen the supply-side structural reform of agriculture. What is worthy of attention is that "structural reforms" appeared five times in the manuscripts of Xinhua News Agency.

Mr Wang said structural overcapacity was evident not only in the industrial sector but also in the agricultural sector. And this surplus, like industry, is at the cost of overdrawing the ecological environment, many of which are unsustainable. Therefore, it is necessary to adjust the agricultural production structure, improve the quality of agricultural products and improve agricultural production efficiency to form a reasonable structure and effective supply of agricultural products.

Cheng Guoqiang, a researcher at the Development Research Center of the State Council, believes that China's current grain supply situation can be summarized as the coexistence of total shortages, structural shortages and surpluses. There are still many varieties of grain, and there are still none. For example, there is a structural surplus of corn, a structural shortage of soybeans, domestic production of strong and weak gluten wheat, more medium gluten wheat, and more indica rice in the south, but it is still increasing production.

Among the five major tasks mentioned at the 2015 Central Economic work Conference, the agricultural sector is also faced with the task of "eliminating inventory, reducing costs and making up for deficiencies". The tone of the meeting is to attach great importance to these three tasks and give countermeasures respectively.

For example, to eliminate inventory, it is required to speed up the digestion of excessive stock of agricultural products and speed up the transformation of grain processing; to reduce costs, it is required to reduce production costs by developing appropriate scale operation, reducing the unreasonable use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides, and carrying out socialized services, so as to improve agricultural efficiency and competitiveness; to make up for deficiencies, it is required to strengthen weak links in agricultural supply, such as agricultural infrastructure, and increase the production of agricultural products in short supply in the market.

The agricultural problems corresponding to the three tasks of agricultural supply-side structural reform are precisely the "difficult problems and challenges" mentioned by General Secretary Xi Jinping in his instructions. Li Qiang said: carrying out structural reform is not only in line with the essential requirements of modern agriculture, but also in line with the requirements of "vigorously promoting agricultural modernization" put forward in the proposal draft of the 13th five-year Plan, and the core of the reform is to improve the quality and efficiency of the agricultural supply system.

How to accomplish the above three tasks, the meeting called for "establishing the concept of big agriculture and big food" and promoting the development of overall planning of grain economy and feeding, the combination of agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry and fishing, the integration of planting and breeding, and the integration of primary, secondary and tertiary industries. This is consistent with the requirements of the draft proposal of the 13th five-year Plan.

The meeting also mentioned that ensuring national food security is the basic bottom line of agricultural structural reform. It is necessary to protect grain rations such as rice and wheat, protect arable land and production capacity, ensure grain production in major producing areas, especially in core producing areas, and ensure basic self-sufficiency in grain and absolute safety in grain rations. In order to give full play to the leading role of appropriate scale operation of various forms of agriculture in structural reform, agricultural support policies should be tilted to the main body of scale operation, and attention should be paid to allowing farmers to share the results. It is necessary to improve the price formation mechanism and collection and storage policies for grain and other important agricultural products, so as to provide impetus for the structural reform of agriculture.

Three ways to increase Farmers' income

Centering on "attaching importance to agriculture and strengthening the foundation," the meeting stressed that local party committees and governments at all levels should unremittingly cultivate an atmosphere of attaching importance to agriculture, and give top priority to agricultural and rural work.

In terms of financial support for agriculture, at the previous central economic work conference, it was clearly proposed to "ensure the steady growth of farmers' income." This rural work conference proposed that priority should be given to ensuring financial input, ensuring that the intensity is not weakened and that the total amount is increased. It is necessary to increase the integration of agriculture-related funds, give full play to the guiding role of financial investment in structural reform, and pry more social funds into agriculture and rural areas. It is necessary to tap the internal potential of agriculture, promote the integrated development of the primary, secondary and tertiary industries, make good use of rural resources and assets, and increase farmers' income through various channels.

This is not only because most of the 70.17 million poor people who accurately help the poor and get rid of poverty are located in rural areas and belong to farmers, but also in the context of the new economic normal, there is a great pressure on economic growth. it is necessary for the whole party to form a joint effort to develop the economy and ensure the growth of farmers' income. Only in this way can we more effectively ensure the smooth realization of the economic growth goal of the entire 13th five-year Plan period and the grand goal of building a moderately prosperous society in an all-round way.

Li Qiang said that there are three ways to increase farmers' income, corresponding to rural resources, assets and funds.

First, make full use of the existing agricultural production factors, agricultural resources and policy support, the overall planning of grain economy and feeding, the combination of agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry and fishing, the integration of planting and breeding, and the integration of primary, secondary and tertiary industries. among them, "Internet +", including the e-commerce of agricultural products, plays a prying role in agriculture. The second is to guide financial funds and social capital to participate in the whole industry chain of large-scale farming, and the financial support funds in the future will also be tilted to the direction of scale and cooperatives, in order to improve farmers' income and production efficiency; third, the reform of rural collective assets such as contracted land, homestead and collective assets to increase farmers' property income.

What is worth paying attention to is the adjustment of planting food crops, cash crops and feed crops brought about by the overall planning of grain, economy and feed.

On 28 June this year, at a forum on agricultural structure adjustment in the four northeastern provinces held in Changchun, Jilin Province, we studied and put forward specific suggestions on the adjustment of planting structure next year, especially the optimization of corn planting structure. Minister of Agriculture Han Changfu stressed that the adjustment of corn planting structure is the key and focus of this round of agricultural restructuring.

Han Changfu said: it is necessary to adjust adaptively, focusing on reducing corn in high latitudes and arid areas, expanding the planting of drought-tolerant miscellaneous grains and beans, combining planting and breeding, giving consideration to both grain and feed, appropriately reducing grain corn and developing silage corn, and ecological protection, with emphasis on reducing corn planting in rocky desertification areas and developing fruit, tea and forage grasses. It is necessary to keep the land under pressure, stabilize grain production capacity, and focus on the leading role of leading enterprises and new business entities around the market adjustment. The focus of the adjustment of corn planting structure is the northeast region, and the four provinces in northeast China will reduce the planting area of corn next year.

Li Qiang said that due to the overcapacity of grain production and the overdraft to the ecological environment, the planting structure will be adjusted. If grain is changed to feed, the planting area of corn will decrease, and feed crops such as silage corn will rise. As a result, the structure of the aquaculture industry will also change. As a result, the meat consumption, which used to be mainly pork and less beef and mutton, will increase year by year in the future. The consequent downward trend in prices.