China has about 900 million rural residents -- peasants as they have been more commonly known -- but increasing numbers are shrugging off the title to become professional farmers.

In the economic powerhouse -- the Yangtze River Delta area where Shanghai and the prosperous provinces of Zhejiang and Jiangsu are located -- peasants are being replaced by the newly emerged farmers.

In his classic work, Eric R. Wolf differentiates peasants from farmers. Wolf wrote that the American farm is primarily a business enterprise, combining factors of production purchased in a market to obtain a profit by selling advantageously in a products market.

Chen Wenxin, a Zhejiang native, is one of this group of new farming businessmen, or a farmer in Wolf's definition. He contracted one year ago a piece of 1.3-hectare land in the suburb of Shanghai to cultivate seedlings for urban use.

Different from traditional peasants of whom he used to be a member, Chen owns a two-story office building where he and eight employees work, and they take a shower and change work clothes before going back home.

"I was born a true peasant, and began to do commercial business 10 years ago because farming income was low," said Chen, 45, his suntanned skin revealing his previous peasant life.

"Now Shanghai has launched green projects everywhere in the city. You can sell as many seedlings as you can produce. That's why I came back to do this," he said.

Now Chen earns 40,000 yuan a year (US$5,000), compared with 10,000 yuan (US$1,209.63) annual income when he was a peasant, 20,000 yuan (US$2,419.26) in a good year but a loss of 5,000 yuan (US$604.81) in a bad year.

For thousands of years, the peasantry was the principal part of Chinese society. Their self-sufficient life gave them a stable living but failed to promise a rich life. Farmers, however, are hoping to change their fate in a market economy in which they are able to run farming as a profitable business.

In the Yangtze River Delta, there are two categories of active "farmers." One group are locals of the area who run profitable market-oriented farming businesses, like horticulture, cash crops and export-targeted farm produce, in suburbs of booming cities. Another group are from neighboring provinces. They are "seasonal farmers" because they come only in busy sowing or harvest periods, working as employed labors and earning salaries.

Wu Zhichong, a researcher with a rural economy research center in Shanghai, said farmers, or farming professionals, first emerged in the region because of high-level economic and social development. Being a traditional region with advanced agricultural production, the region's fast-paced urbanization and industrialization in recent years built up demand for farm produce and an improved market allowed farmers to profit from the trade.

In the booming city of Yiwu in Zhejiang, the peasantry population stands at 500,000, but only one-third are engaged in true farming.

Yiwu is planning to reduce farmers to 50,000 or 80,000 at most.

Chinese peasants used to be "hereditary," and were harshly restricted to their peasantry identity in the past.

(Xinhua News Agency September 11, 2003)