Ban it

There are more compelling reasons to ban the rice-for-the-rich.

Farming has never been lucrative, but for thousands of years nearly all Chinese governments had placed a higher premium on farming, believing that the wealth of a nation was derived solely from the value of "land cultivation."

Thus, although it has never been easy to eke out more than a subsistence by cultivating small plots of land, farming in China has been all along a dignified calling, with many mandarins citing farming as more ennobling than a political career.

But when a peasant's labor is grabbed and stolen at two yuan for 500 grams and then rebranded by a crafty businessman who, with a snap of the finger, resells it at 199 yuan, we find it not unlike adding insult to injury.

It is a mockery of honest labor.

It also does little to reconnect migrants workers to the land from which they have become estranged in recent years.

A recent survey conducted by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences found that more than half of Chinese peasants wish their land would be appropriated by the state and that they would be fairly compensated.

A young migrant worker from Henan Province working in Shanghai posted online allegations about illegal land expropriation back home, and thanks to his exposure, the grabbed land was returned to local peasants.

Contrary to expectations, when the young man returned home, he was not welcomed as a hero, but as the target of overwhelming public outrage, for he deprived villagers of the coveted chance to leave peasant behind and be compensated. He was forced to flee his home.

In an article in China Business Weekly, writer Zheng Fengtian estimated that compared to growing one mu (0.16 acre) of wheat near Beijing's Fourth Ring Road area, erecting buildings in the same plot could be at least 300,000 times more profitable.

For years Chinese peasants have turned their back on the land, moving to cities for work and leaving the elderly and children behind to fend for themselves.

On New Year's Eve during a visit to a construction site in Hunan Province, Premier Wen Jiabao talked about the issue of left-behind village children.

This is an issue affecting tens of millions of rural households.

And any solution would be elusive if it fails to invest Chinese land tillers with the dignity they deserve.

This rice case might be isolated, but reflects vividly the plight of Chinese peasants.