Crop Farming China E-News

As of 19 Oct., 2014, the Chinese government has passed all the pilot projects for the reform on rural collective property, so as to develop a shareholding system from which farmers can realize benefits. Meanwhile, they can also sell a share or take it as collateral or warranty. This indicates that the pilot projects to distribute the collective property in rural areas will be launched all around China. The pilot projects will cover different regions in eastern, western and central China, and will target at several counties and cities. The projects will be finished by the end of 2017.

However, the reform may encounter many problems. For one thing, the rural economy in China is a kind of collective economy, with farmers pertaining to the basic collective organization namely village. Therefore, in order to developing a shareholding system for farmers to realize benefits, it is very essential to reform and improve the collective economic system in rural areas. Nevertheless, it is of little possibility to carry out the reform on the rural collective economic system. For another, no specific definition is given to the collective organization in rural areas. Meanwhile, still there are many problems concerning the relationship between rural collective economic organizations and rural social organizations such as villager committee and villager groups.

In addition, the reform on rural collective property is closely related to the crop farming industry, which is mainly reflected in land treatment. Generally, rural collective property refers to resources and non-resources belonging to villages (towns and streets) and all members from the collective organizations. Specifically, they are collectively-owned natural resources, such as land, forests, hills, plains, uncultivated land and water bodies. Also, the collectively-owned current assets, long-term assets, fixed assets, intangible assets and other assets are included.

The reform aims to give rights to farmers to sell a share or take it as collateral or warranty. They also have the right of succession. Then farmers may have more power to take control of the land use. Compared with land in other uses, the benefit generated from the land for non-planting use may be larger. This is a big attraction to the farmers. Therefore, if the reform is launched throughout the country, will it bring great changes to China’s crop planting areas?

Note: 1. All tables and figures in this issue are calculated by the same RMB/USD exchange rate (USD1=RMB6.1539); 2. Nuances in some data are mainly caused by rounding principle.