The Road to Food Self-sufficiency Economy

By staff reporter HOU RUILI

Science and technology is the catalyst of agricultural modernization. China Foto Press

CHINA'S grain production accounts for a fourth of the world's total output, and its population for a fifth," said Chen Xiwen, deputy head of the Central Rural Work Leading Group, when discussing how China succeeds at self-sufficiency with respect to basic agricultural products. "China is a responsible country that is making significant contributions to global food security."

Food has always been an issue of top priority in China. In the last 11 years, the rate of self-sufficiency has hovered around 95 percent. In 2010, after good harvests for seven years in a row, China's grain output reached a record 540 million tons and grain reserves swelled to nearly 200 million tons.

According to the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) and World Health Organization (WHO), the "subsistence level" standard refers to 0.36 ton of grain per capita in a year. Since 1983, China has achieved per capita levels plus or minus 10 percent of 0.38 ton, which means with a population of 1.3 billion, the nation produces 500 million tons of grain, twice the world grain trade volume.

Grain Self-sufficiency

China has achieved self-sufficiency in grains, including wheat, rice and maize, and according to Chen, "China is working toward the goal of increasing its production capacity by 50 million tons. The 12th Five-year Plan sets an annual output target of 540 million tons. Grain production in fact has surpassed this, but due to climate and other elements output cannot be considered stable."

Northeast China is recognized worldwide as a high-quality soybean production area. However, the country has reduced acreage devoted to soybean in order to guarantee grain production. Soybeans are valued as an oil crop and bean dregs as good animal feed. Chinese people consume about 25 million tons of the vegetable oil every year. Customs statistics show that China imported 54.8 million tons of soybeans in 2010, which is 60 percent of the world total trade volume in soy and 75 percent of the domestic demand for this product.

"At this degree of dependence on imported soybeans, we can hardly expect to have any control over prices for vegetable oil and feed. What's more, feed prices influence the costs of meat, poultry, eggs and milk and those animal by-products will also slip from our grip. China should restructure its agricultural system and increase production capacity of those items in short supply," Chen Xiwen suggested. He also commented that giving full play to advantages inherent in both international and domestic markets is the inevitable direction globalization imposes.

Protect Farmland

To guarantee food security, the Chinese government is intent on sustaining a total arable land area of no less than 120 million hectares by the year 2020. As per the multiple crop index (two or three crops can be harvested a year in some southern provinces), the real area can reach 156 million hectares. We need 106 million hectares for planting grain at the current output level of 4,950 kg per hectare. The remaining 46 million hectares can be designated for other essential crops, including oil crops, cotton, sugar plantations, vegetables and crops like tea, fiber plants, herbs, tobacco and fruit orchards.

As industrialization and urbanization reach into the countryside, the arable area in China is gradually decreasing. The first agricultural census in 1996 identified 130 million hectares of arable area. Since that time the figure has decreased, leaving only 121 million hectares by the end of 2008. To offset this trend, the Chinese government required a "dynamic balance" of farmland be restored; if farmland was used for construction, the same area of waste or poor-yield land should be transformed into arable land.

Waste land that is suitable for farming, and mountainous and other territories suitable for planting forest are estimated at 35 million hectares and 63 million hectares respectively. You Hongbing, director of the General Office of the Central Committee of Chinese Peasants and Workers Democratic Party, also confirms undeveloped grassland stands at 313 million hectares, accounting for 32.64 percent of China's total land mass.

Irrigation and Water Conservancy Projects

Irrigation systems are the "blood vessels" of agriculture. However, efficient irrigation serves only 49 percent of China's farmlands. The first document the central government released in 2011 was addressed to accelerating reforms on irrigation works. This is the first time the state has deployed a full-spectrum approach to irrigation reform and development.

According to the document, the government takes a leading role in the construction of irrigation works, and irrigation is also a key area for public financial input. Ten percent of land transfer fees will be directed to irrigation and water conservancy projects. The Agricultural Development Bank is encouraged to issue mid- and long-term loans to irrigation works. With these measures and incentives, the government will double the annual investment in irrigation from its 2010 level in the coming decade.

Water-saving technologies also help reduce demand for water, a scarce resource in China. "Advanced technologies like sprinkling and trickle irrigation can save a lot of water," said Chen Xiwen. "In water-deficient areas we can popularize dry cultivation methods and develop water-saving agriculture."

Agricultural Science and Technology

Agricultural science has increased the quality and quantity of Chinese agricultural yields. High-quality seeds are the fruit of agricultural science. Now more than 95 percent of staple agricultural products are of fine breeds cultivated through hybridizing or genetic modification. Chinese scientists have independently developed a number of new transgenic crop varieties of great application value.

Advanced farming technologies have also increased output. Mulching film extends the frost-free season, so plants have a longer growing period and an extended producing region. Greenhouses, commonly seen in northern China, make it possible to bring on vegetable crops earlier in cold areas. Plant protection, animal epidemic prevention and other technologies help reduce producing cost and increase food security.

"Science and technology are the driving forces to transform traditional agriculture to modern agri-business," says Cheng Ping, deputy director of Agricultural Department of Guangdong Province, and she adds more bluntly, "The quality of farmers, to a large extent, restricts the take-up of agricultural science and technology." Low agricultural efficiency drives young farmers with a higher education or skill set to flood into the cities. Urbanization itself contributes to the continuously dwindling number of farmers. To reverse the tide, agriculture must convert from a labor-intensive to a technology-intensive mode.

In 2004 the government began to introduce a series of training sessions for farmers. In addition, farmers' organizations specializing in particular agricultural operations are encouraged to help increase agricultural efficiency. "If some workers focus on marketing, some on transportation and some on farming, the efficiency will improve," Chen Xiwen believes, and furthermore, "an organization is stronger when negotiating with dealers, and also it reduces costs. If every farmer bought a tractor, the machine will be frequently unused and unproductive. But in an organization, if one farmer buys a tractor, another one can buy a seeder, and yet another a harvester."

Food Reserves

"Government reserves are very necessary for products as critical as food. Reserves support macro-adjustment measures and price management," points out Chen Xiwen. Currently China has reserves of food, cotton, vegetable oil, sugar and pork. When oversupply leads to falling prices, the government stocks up, prodding market prices back to normal. When the output of agricultural and sideline products decreases due to bad weather or other disasters, the government sells reserve to keep prices stable.

After solving its own subsistence problems, China was able to provide foreign aid, for example to African countries in the form of high-quality seeds, irrigation technology and equipment, and planting machinery. The aid has helped increase the agricultural output of these countries, and Chen Xiwen speculates: "Increased production will help maintain stability in international markets, which is very beneficial for China."