Recently, Professor Zhang Jie made a controversial point: Chinese farmers can earn 2 million yuan a year by contracting 30 acres of land to grow celery with a little effort. As soon as this theory was proposed, it immediately sparked a heated discussion among the public.
An annual income of 2 million yuan is indeed eye-catching for the vast majority of peasant families, but can it really be so simple to achieve rural prosperity? Let's examine the possible shortcomings of this theory.
We must admit that under the current phenomenon of small field division that is widespread in the rural areas of the mainland, it is not easy to find 30 acres of contiguous usable land for planting. Since the beginning of reform and opening up, the implementation of the household responsibility system has enabled the development of rural land on a large scale.
Farmers were granted the right to operate the land. But long-term family distribution has led to extreme fragmentation of rural land. According to statistics, the average land area acquired by each farm household in rural China is less than 1 mu. It is almost impossible to concentrate 30 acres of land for planting. Even with long-term leases, it takes a lot of time and effort to be able to gather such a large area of land.
On the other hand, there is a strong risk of market price fluctuations in vegetable cultivation. As a common vegetable variety for the public, the price of celery is easily affected by market supply and demand.
Once the market is oversupplied, celery prices plummet, severely squeezing growers' profit margins. If the price plummets, it will become extremely difficult to reach 2 million yuan in sales revenue by planting 30 acres of celery.
Modern large-scale agricultural production requires a large amount of capital to be invested as an upfront operating cost. From the purchase of seedlings and fertilizers to the allocation of irrigation equipment, farmers need to have considerable start-up capital.
Agricultural production is also highly susceptible to natural disasters, and a flood or hailstorm may wipe out the peasants' labor in the first quarter. This kind of high input cost but also high risk makes farmers need to bear greater operating pressure.
Of course, there are still successful cases of large-scale cultivation of celery or other vegetable crops in areas with excellent conditions. These cases often rely on good geographical conditions, abundant water resources, as well as technological progress and modern planting methods of farmers. But after all, this can only represent the situation of a very small number of farmers, and it is difficult to be widely replicated.
The experts' theories are full of imagination for the new mode of agricultural development, but there is still a certain distance from being truly realized by the vast number of farmers. In order to enable more peasants to embark on the road of steadily increasing income, it is necessary to do further work.
Carry out a new round of land circulation in rural areas, allow land to be freely traded and leased, and reduce the problem of land fragmentation.
Improve the agricultural insurance system so that farmers can spread the risk of natural disasters and market price fluctuations.
We should intensify the research and development and popularization of agricultural science and technology, and improve agricultural productivity and resource utilization efficiency.
Cultivate professional farmer cooperatives, realize large-scale operation and industrial chain extension, and increase farmers' income.
Improve rural infrastructure, provide public services such as farmland and water conservancy, and reduce production costs.
Strengthen the construction of quality standards for agricultural products, ensure product safety, and expand market sales.
Only by systematically promoting the supply-side structural reform of agriculture and raising the overall agricultural productivity to a new level can the dream of increasing peasants' incomes become a reality.
Only by adopting systematic and coordinated reform measures and continuing to promote the supply-side structural reform of agriculture can we achieve a leap in the overall level of agricultural productivity, so that the vast number of farmers can truly enjoy the dividends of modern agricultural development and gradually embark on the road of moderate prosperity. This requires the joint efforts of the national level and the rural grassroots, as well as a long-term process of exploration.