Dusk Falls on Divided Fields

Translated and additional research by Zuo Maohong
Original article: [Chinese]

"Villagers used to call village leaders the "three ask-for" people – they ask for money, for grain, and for lives.....Now the agricultural tax has been cancelled. We didn't ask for anything any more, so our role has changed too. Our job now is to serve and guide people in policy." -- grassroots leader, Luo Shoubo.

A new nation-wide land reform might take place in China after a secretive four-day high-level communist party meeting focusing on rural development concluded on October 12 in Beijing.

The Third Plenary Session of the 17th CPC Central Committee has drawn a framework for rural development in the next decade. As a tradition, the meeting brought forward fundamental principles and made general suggestions instead of specific policies.

Central government mouthpiece Xinhua News Agency interpreted that there would be more room for experimentation, and that the government would strictly keep total farmland acreage above 1.8 billion mu (120 million hectares).

Moreover, the government would spend more to boost agriculture with subsidies and by controlling prices of products, Xinhua reported.

Many observers and scholars have anticipated that the new round of vigorous rural development would lead to a second wave of land reform, a follow-up to the first that took place in 1978 when China began to head towards a market-oriented economy.

Thirty years ago, in China's Anhui province, the collective agricultural production mode that had dominated China's rural economy for two decades was reformed into a household responsibility system, under which farmland was still owned by the state but production and management were entrusted to individual farming households through long-term contracts.

Today, it is still this province, which "exports" droves of farmers-turned-migrant workers to other cities, that has pioneered in a new reform – to assemble idle land into a cooperative made up of local farmers and rent its land-use rights to those who need it.

The first "land transfer cooperative" was set up in the province's Mulan village. Later 19 other nearby villages had established similar organization, with 42.54% of all farming households having joined it.

As transferred land should still be used for agricultural purposes, the reform wouldn't violate laws such as the Land Administration Law.

Luo Shoubo had been a member of Mulan village's committee since 1991. Now the secretary of the committee, Luo still farmed on two mu (about 1,333 square meters) of his own land. The village's cooperative had taken over the other four mu.

The EO talked with Luo in Mulan in this autumn harvest season.

EO: During the thirty years of reform and opening-up, the rural land system has undergone frequent reforms. What do you think of these changes?

Luo Shoubo: There is an aphorism from our ancestors - the world would become divided after enjoying long years of unity; but unity would return after long years of division. This phrase has profound meaning.

In the early years of reform and opening-up, Feixi county's Xiaojinzhuang took the lead in experimenting with the household contract responsibility system, which threw off the shackles of egalitarianism and put an end to farmers' eating from the same big pot. This system greatly inspired farmers' initiative, and grain output therefore saw big growth. It also helped farmers to have adequate food and clothing.

But as the reform went further, China's agriculture entered a new phase, where market competition grew fiercer and small-scale household production didn't suit the changing market anymore. The new situation required that agricultural products be commercialized and farmers organize.

So, on the condition that farmers still have the contractual right to operate land, by transferring this right among farmers through a cooperative not only overcomes the weak points of collective operation, but also fits the new rural economy.

EO: Socialogist Cao Jingqing once said that Chinese farmers have always been good at independent operation but poor at cooperation. It should be difficult to reassemble land from their hands – we found that only 30% of farmland has joined the cooperative.

Luo Shoubo: It's true that some farmers aren't willing to join the cooperative. They are mostly over 50, not open-minded, and still mentally dependant on land. They wouldn't easily give out their land.

There are still some others choose not do so to save face. These people had already entrusted their land to relatives before the cooperative was set up. Because the relatives paid taxes when farming the land, they thought it a shame to take it back and make more profits elsewhere.

Another reason is the cooperative doesn't accept land that is inconvenient for farming. We'll gradually improve such land. Or goal is to assemble all land in three to five years.

EO: Why can the transferred land only be contracted for one year? Have you ever thought of prolonging the term?

Luo Shoubo: Leaders from the Ministry of Agriculture and the provincial government asked me the same question. We made it one year mainly to guarantee the farmers' interests. Since grain prices have been rising, a long-term contract with a fixed price would harm farmers' interest. Also, because at present there are many projects being carried out in our village, like the construction of roads and irrigation works, it's hard to control a long-term contract's impact on these projects. The contractor's benefits may also be harmed.

EO: After these years of experiment in the land transfer program, what problems need to be solved?

Luo Shoubo: First of all it's the people's knowledge about the new setup. They need some time to walk out of the independent operation mode and accept this new way. For example, some of them think a cooperative economy is contradictory to household management. Others think the cooperative only helps to reuse idle land and protect the interest of those who have left to work elsewhere, but cuts benefits for those who farm at home.

Also, our program is still implemented in a small scale. It's confined to our village, and takes up a small portion in major local industries. It doesn't have a large enough influence on neighboring areas.

The last problem would be the internal operation mechanism. As a new organization, its operation mechanism needs to be gradually improved in practice, especially the setup of departments, work division, and internal control.

EO: What impressed you most during the years of being a village leader?

Luo Shoubo: Villagers used to call village leaders the "three ask-for" people – they ask for money, for grain, and for lives. At that time, ordinary villagers had a bad relationship with leaders. They didn't trust them.

When I was the village's head, I heard people say that if you wanted others to listen to you, you must listen to others first. Now the agricultural tax has been cancelled. We didn't ask for anything any more, so our role has changed too. Our job now is to serve and guide people in policy.

EO: Besides the land transfer experiment, what else are village leaders concerned about?

Luo Shoubo: Actually what we are concerned about most now is the birth control problem. Our superiors come to inspect the situation four times a year. They ask farmers questions about the family planning policy. You know farmers don't have much education, so it's really hard for them to answer these questions. If they don't answer, then "points" are deducted for the village. If too many points are deducted, the village cadre is removed, and if that happens, well, then nothing in the village can get done.