|
IV. Striving to Improve
Production Conditions
to Increase the Comprehensive Grain Production Ability |
A series of measures will be adopted in protecting cultivated land resources, increasing agricultural input, and improving water conservancy facilities and the standard of agricultural equipment so as to increase China's comprehensive grain production ability. Only in this way can it fulfill the task of increasing grain output.Protecting cultivated land is always the foundation for increased grain production. Over the years, certain laws and regulations have been worked out and perfected, including the Agriculture Law, Land Management Law and Water and Soil Conservation Law. The result has been an alleviation in the trend of rapid reduction of cultivated land, the net area of cultivated land reduction having dropped to less than 200,000 ha from the annual average of 300,000 ha before the 1990s. Following the speeding up of industrialization in the future there will be a growing demand for land for economic construction. In view of this the government will, in light of the principle of ``economization on land use and little or no occupation of cultivated land,'' adopt still more effective measures to ensure the dynamic equilibrium of the total cultivated land, restrict occupation of cultivated land for non-agricultural purposes, improve the land preservation system and strengthen the protection of basic farmland. The examination and approval system for the use of land for construction must be implemented strictly and the development scale of cities controlled so as to efficiently use the available land and increase the land utilization rate. Administration of the plans for village and township construction and township enterprise development will be strengthened. Scattered township enterprises will be joined together to form industrial districts and residential areas concentrated to save as much land as possible for farming. A policy of linking the appropriation of land for non-agricultural construction purposes to land development and reclamation will be implemented. Since the founding of New China, led by the Chinese government the Chinese people have built 84,000 reservoirs as well as many other flood control and water storage projects to improve production conditions. They have also improved 20 million ha of areas liable to waterlogging. The irrigated area has increased to the present 49.33 million ha from 16 million ha in the early Liberation period, and the water supply capability has reached 500 billion cubic meters, greatly strengthening the ability of agriculture to withstand natural calamities. The Chinese government will continue to work hard to build a group of large and medium-sized water control projects to solve the problem of unbalanced distribution of water resources in different regions and seasons. Agricultural capital construction will be undertaken on an extensive scale, so that the eective area of irrigated land will reach 53.30 million ha by 2000, 56.70 million ha by 2010 and 66.70 million ha by 2030, respectively accounting for 56 percent, 60 percent and 70 percent of the cultivated land. The rebuilding and repair of key irrigation and drainage projects should be quickened to increase the area with stable yields despite drought or excessive rain to more than 40 million ha in 2030 from the present 33 million ha. The per unit area yield of more than 20 million ha of the 2030 figure will reach 15 tons per ha. The use of water-saving irrigation methods and dry land farming are encouraged. Also by 2030, the area irrigated by water-saving irrigation methods will be increased to more than 40 million ha from the present 13 million ha and the effective utilization rate of irrigation water will be increased to more than 60 percent from 40 percent. In addition, the effective utilization rate of natural precipitation will be raised to upwards of 30 percent. At the same time, the improvement of medium- and low-yield fields should be speeded up. China plans to upgrade 14 million ha of medium- and low-yield fields by 2000, with a target upgrading of 60 million ha of medium- and low-yield fields by 2030. Since the founding of New China, agroindustry has developed by leaps and bounds, playing an important role in ensuring increased grain production. The total output of chemical fertilizer has increased to the present 24.5 million tons from 39,000 tons in the early Liberation period (expressed in 100 percent available ingredients -- similarly hereinafter), and the amount used has increased to 35.70 million tons from 79,000 tons, averaging 375 kg per hectare of cultivated land. Agricultural machinery power has increased to 360.7 billion watts from 1.21 billion watts in the same period, the number of large and medium-sized tractors has increased to 670,000 from 1,300 and that of agricultural trucks to 800,000 from 4,000. Nowadays in the rural areas 162.8 billion kwh of electricity are used per year, while in the early Liberation period the figure was only 50 million kwh. As a whole, however, the agroindustry today is still unable to meet the needs of sustained agricultural development. For this reason, China will continue to make great efforts to expand its chemical fertilizer production and raise the self-sufficiency rate of chemical ferti"ilizer. By 2000 China will be basically self-sufficient in nitrogenous ferti"ilizer. At the same time, the production of farm chemicals, plastic lm, agricultural machinery and electrical power and diesel oil will be developed rapidly. The structure of national income and capital distribution of society will be gradually adjusted. Priority should be given to agriculture, especially grain production, in terms of planning and capital input, and a higher percentage of the fixed assets investment, state budgeted funds and bank loans will go to agriculture so as to increase the total agricultural input. By 2000 agricultural investment in the budget for the capital construction plan of the central government will increase to more than 20 percent from the present 17 percent. In light of the practice of the central government, local governments will also increase their investment in agriculture. The annual agricultural input of financial departments at all levels should increase by a wider margin than regular financial revenues. The increase rate of agricultural loans should be higher than that of other loans. The proportion of agricultural loans should exceed 10 percent of the total bank loans and credit cooperatives should increase the proportion of their agricultural loans. The rural financial system should be further improved, including the establishment of a rural policy bank, commercial bank and cooperative financial organization. The rural policy funds should be guaranteed to be mainly used for grain production. The Chinese government will continue to adopt a series of policies and measures for increasing the efficiency of agricultural input so as to promote enthusiasm for increasing input in grain production on the part of rural collective economy organizations and households. With the promise of due benefits to investors, the government should extend loans to large industrial and commercial enterprises which engage in agricultural development. The scale of using foreign investment for agriculture should be expanded, and preferential treatment provided for such investment, especially in grain production. |
||||