Aerial photo taken on Oct. 21, 2021 shows a photovoltaic power station in Liuqiukou Village of Xinhe County in north China's Hebei Province. Xinhe County boosts rural vitalization by developing distinctive agricultural products, improving living environment and elevating governance capability. [Xinhua / Wang Xiao]
BEIJING - China unveiled its "No 1 central document" for 2022 on Feb 22, outlining key tasks to comprehensively push forward rural vitalization this year.
As the first policy statement released by China's central authorities each year, the document is seen as an indicator of policy priorities. Work on agriculture and rural areas has been high on the agenda for 19 consecutive years since 2004.
The document called for efforts to stabilize and increase agricultural production, steadily raise farmers' incomes, and ensure stability in China's rural areas to cope with the COVID-19 pandemic and other changes unseen in a century and promote sound economic and social development.
The document emphasizes supportive infrastructure measures for the development of modern agriculture. The 120 million hectares of arable land baseline should be strictly protected. Additionally, in 2022, China aims to develop 6.67 million hectares of high-standard farmland, to build a total 26.67 million hectares of efficient water-saving irrigation farmland, promote national projects on black soil protection, and launch the third nationwide soil condition census, noted the document.
It also specified measures to vigorously promote the research on vital agricultural core technologies such as germplasm, enhance applications of agriculture machinery and equipment, accelerate development of facility agriculture, and effectively prevent and respond to major agriculture-related disasters.
The document urged efforts to improve mechanisms for monitoring and assisting people at risk of falling back into poverty, and to ensure assistance and support policies are implemented in a timely manner.
More efforts should be made to help boost the incomes of populations that have recently been lifted out of poverty, according to the document.
China will increase support for key counties in rural vitalization and for communities of relocated people while working to promote the integrated development of the primary, secondary and tertiary industries in rural areas, it said.
Efforts should be made to develop county-level industries and commerce systems, as well as to encourage rural residents to obtain employment or start businesses locally, said the document.
In an interview with Xinhua, Minister of Agriculture and Rural Affairs Tang Renjian said the country should consolidate poverty-reduction achievements with steady economic growth, with more financial support tilted toward developing the technology, facilities and marketing of rural industries that help increase the incomes of rural households.
Tang listed farm-produce processing, rural tourism and rural e-commerce as three major industries for rural vitalization, and stressed the prevention of excessive financing, development and construction, so as to yield practical results.
The document also urged the continued implementation of the five-year action plan on improving the rural living environment, stressing solid work on enhancing rural infrastructure in key areas such as highways, water facilities, power grids and clean-energy facilities, as well as improving the quality of rural housing. The document specified that village development should be based on existing foundation of villages, and stop blindly demolish old villages and build new ones. Coordinate the layout of towns and villages, scientifically determine the classification of villages, accelerate the preparation of rural planning in villages with conditions and needs, and strictly regulate the abolition of villages. Protect the characteristic ethnic villages.
It called for greater efforts on developing digital villages by pushing for smart agriculture and empowering rural public services with digital technologies.
Also, the document emphasizes on strengthening the coordination of fundamental public services. Accelerate the construction of urbanization with the county as an important carrier. Strengthen the construction of inclusive, basic and bottom-up livelihoods, and promote the transformation of basic public service provision from focusing on institutional administrative area coverage to focusing on service coverage for the long-term resident population. This includes educational services, medical services, elder care and daycare services, as well as social welfare services covering aging population, children, and people with disabilities.
The document noted that measures should be taken to increase investment for rural vitalization, such as providing support from the public budget and the central government budget, and supporting the issuance of local-government bonds for qualified projects.
It also stressed optimizing financial services to advance rural vitalization. More support will be provided for qualified local financial institutions in terms of relending, rediscounts and required reserves.
More work will be done to strengthen the building of a rural credit system and facilitate credit lending for rural households, while agricultural insurance and reinsurance will be actively promoted, it said.
The document also proposed to improve the recruitment and training systems of talent for rural vitalization.
Source: <https://english.www.gov.cn/policies/latestreleases/202202/22/content_WS6214de0dc6d09c94e48a5577.html>
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