Overview of China’s Agriculture
In such a large agriculture country, China’s agriculture has always been the foundation of its national economy. Great importance has been attached to China’s agriculture because it is of special importance for a country like China with 70% of its population living in the rural areas. Thanks to the reform in 1978 and high-tech development, China’s agriculture, being full of vigor and vitality, has created a miracle of feeding one fifth of the world’s population with only seven percent of the world's cultivated land, making great contribution to the world food security and agricultural development.
Ancient Chinese Agriculture-China's agriculture approximately originated from 10,000 years ago，and gradually developed from the economy of fishing , collection and hunting. From 2100 BC to771 BC, Bronze began to be used in agricultural production. During Chinese feudal society, small-scale peasant economy，a kind of self-sufficient economy, was the fundamental mode of its agricultural production and the main purpose of production was to meet their basic living needs and pay taxes.
Since the reform in 1978, with the introduction of a household-based contract system to rural areas, farmers were given again the right to use land, to arrange their planting and dispose of their products. Besides, farmers were allowed to develop a variety of businesses and set up township enterprises because of the annulment of the state monopoly for purchase and marketing, the termination of price controls over most agricultural products, and the abolishment of many earlier restrictive policies. Due to the reform, the structure of agriculture was optimized, the rural productive forces developed in high speed and there have been remarkable achievements in China's agriculture.
China's agriculture development maintained a fairly good momentum after overcoming many unprecedented difficulties since 1990s. According to the National Bureau of Statistics, in 2007, the total grain output reached 501.5 million tons，3.5 million tons more than the previous year, with a growth of 0.7%. The year became the fourth high-yield year since 1985. The summer grain output was 115.34 million tons; an increase of 1.3 %.Autumn grain output was 354.2 million tons, an increase of 0.6 percent. Today China leads the world in production of grain, cotton, rapeseed, peanut, meat and fruit.
Township Enterprises—the Driving Force for China’s Agriculture
Township enterprises are farmer-initiated enterprises in rural areas. They involved in many sectors, including industry, agricultural processing, transportation and communications, construction, commerce and catering. Thanks to household-based contract system, huge gains in agricultural efficiency have released a huge numbers of rural laborers from the land, which led to development of township enterprises.
By the end of 2007, the total profits of Chinese township enterprises have reached 1.69 trillion Yuan, an increase of 13.9 % over the previous year, generating about 6600 billion Yuan in added value. The operating income reached 28 trillion Yuan, an increase of 13.5%. Township enterprises have been the main driving force for the increase in farmers' income and agriculture development, absorbing about 30 percent of the rural labor force.
Sci-tech Achievements on China’s Agriculture
In the agricultural sci-tech sphere, China has constantly narrowed its gap with the advanced countries, and improved sci-tech knowledge by conveying advanced sci-tech achievements to the rural areas, examples including the Spark Program, the Promotion of Important Achievements Plan, the Bumper Harvest Plan, and the Prairie Fire Program. Advanced science and technology has enhanced China’s agricultural production in such areas as cultivation of plant cells and tissues, anther culture, bilinear hybrid rice, and multi-crop planting etc. Since 1949 Chinese agricultural scientists have cultivated more than 40 varieties of crops, and 5,000 high-yield, excellent-quality and strong-resistant new varieties and new combinations, which make a big increase in agriculture output.
Government Programs for China’s Agriculture
Since China's entry into WTO in 2001, China’s agriculture has engaged in free international trade and global competition. The Chinese government restructured its agriculture, invested funds in speeding up agricultural science and technology progress to improve the international competitiveness of Chinese agricultural products by three projects—"intensively processing main agricultural products", "milk industry development" and "water-saving agriculture", which have been included in the 12 important scientific and technological application projects initiated by the Ministry of Science and Technology at a cost of 20 billion Yuan. In 2003, China initiated six high-technology agricultural projects involving cultivation of new varieties, reduction of environmental pollution in efficient planting, as well as aquatic breeding.