Review: What New Signals on Agricultural Inputs Does the Government Work Report Send?

On the 5th, the Fifth Session of the 13th National People’s Congress opened at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, where Premier Li Keqiang delivered the Government Work Report. The report outlined detailed plans and prospects for agricultural development, signaling new directions for the agricultural inputs sector.

This year’s report once again underscores the importance of food security. It notes that the global pandemic persists, the world economy lacks sufficient momentum for recovery, commodity prices remain volatile at high levels, and the external environment has grown increasingly complex, severe, and uncertain. In response, the Government Work Report sets one of this year’s key development targets as maintaining grain output above 1.3 trillion jin. To achieve this goal, we must vigorously strengthen agricultural production and promote all-round rural revitalization.

To ensure stable production and secure supplies of grain and other key agricultural products, the report emphasizes maintaining the area sown to grain, strengthening field management for summer crops in response to late‑sown wheat, and boosting output of soybeans and oilseed crops. It also calls for a moderate increase in the minimum purchase prices for rice and wheat, enhanced capacity to prevent and control agro‑meteorological disasters and animal and plant diseases, and stronger regulation of hog production capacity, while ensuring steady supply of livestock, poultry, aquatic products, and vegetables. By filling the “rice bag” and enriching the “vegetable basket,” we will keep the food security of China’s more than 1.4 billion people firmly in our own hands.

Since last year, influenced by a confluence of domestic and international factors, fertilizer prices have risen steadily, significantly increasing farmers’ production costs. As fertilizers are the “food of food,” ensuring stable supply and prices and safeguarding farmers’ enthusiasm for grain production are essential measures for securing a bumper harvest. In this regard, the report underscores the need to maintain stable supplies and prices of fertilizers and other agricultural inputs, to provide another round of subsidies to grain farmers, and to strengthen support for major grain-producing regions.

Soil is the foundation of food production; only when arable land is secure can food security be ensured. In August 2021, the results of the Third National Land Survey showed that China’s arable land totaled just 1.918 billion mu, a decrease of 113 million mu compared with ten years earlier, reflecting a steady downward trend. The report clearly states the need to firmly safeguard the red line of 1.8 billion mu of arable land, designate and demarcate sufficient permanent basic farmland, effectively curb the “non-agricultural use” of arable land, and prevent its conversion to non‑grain crops. It also calls for intensifying efforts to protect black soils and promote the comprehensive utilization of saline‑alkali lands, while upgrading medium- and low‑yield farmlands and developing 100 million mu of high-standard farmland.

Seeds are the “chips” of agriculture. China’s seed industry urgently needs to strengthen its capacity for independent innovation by advancing breakthroughs in critical core technologies, elevating its scientific and technological standards, and achieving self-reliance and self-strengthening in seed science and technology, as well as ensuring independent and controllable access to seed resources. The report calls for accelerating the revitalization of the seed industry and intensifying research on agricultural technologies while expanding their application.

Energy supply is critical to the development of agrochemical enterprises, and, in light of the national call for reducing fertilizer use while enhancing efficiency, the dual‑carbon strategy has long been a focal point for those in the agricultural inputs sector. Advancing carbon peaking and carbon neutrality in the agriculture and rural sectors is a key component of accelerating ecological civilization in agriculture. The report underscores the need to steadily advance carbon‑peaking and carbon‑neutral initiatives and to implement the action plan for achieving carbon peaking. It calls for driving an energy revolution, ensuring reliable energy supplies, promoting a low‑carbon energy transition, and fostering the research, development, and widespread application of green and low‑carbon technologies.

At present, agricultural modernization cannot do without the support of scientific and technological innovation, and agricultural talent is indispensable. The report emphasizes the need to implement the innovation-driven development strategy in depth, advance scientific and technological innovation, promote industrial optimization and upgrading, break through bottlenecks in supply constraints, and rely on innovation to enhance the quality of development. It calls for accelerating the building of a globally significant center for talent and a hub of innovation, improving the systems and mechanisms for talent development, strengthening support for young researchers, and enabling all types of talent to devote themselves to research and fully demonstrate their capabilities.

The Government Work Report sent a strong signal of support for agriculture, and representatives and members from the agricultural sector have also put forward numerous proposals and suggestions on issues related to agriculture, rural areas, and farmers.

National People’s Congress deputy and Director of the Soybean Research Institute at the Heze Academy of Agricultural Sciences in Shandong, Wang Qiuling, stated: At present, China’s soybean seed industry faces both challenges and opportunities. Since the reform and opening-up, the sector has made remarkable progress, developing numerous high‑quality varieties that are widely favored by farmers. However, it is also important to recognize that the industry’s shortcomings are becoming increasingly apparent, particularly the urgent need to strengthen independent innovation through breakthroughs in key core technologies and to elevate its overall scientific and technological capabilities. Today, the global seed industry has entered the era of breeding 4.0, and our current breeding conditions and methods can no longer compete with those of advanced countries.

Therefore, it is recommended to increase investment in scientific research, enhance soybean breeding technologies, and strengthen the independent innovation capacity of the soybean seed industry. Support for nationwide collaborative research on soybeans should be reinforced, with efforts to foster close integration among industry, academia, and research institutions, optimize top-level design, pool resources, and establish a robust breeding system. Furthermore, intellectual property protection must be strengthened, and infringement and trademark‑piracy practices should be rigorously prosecuted.

National People’s Congress deputy and researcher at the Guangxi Plant Protection Station, Wang Huasheng, stated: China is a major agricultural country prone to frequent pest and disease outbreaks. Crop pests and diseases are occurring with increasing frequency and severity, with over 1,600 common types of plant diseases, insect pests, weeds, and rodent infestations. When multiple major pests and diseases strike severely, failure to implement effective prevention and control measures will pose a serious threat to food production security and the reliable supply of agricultural products. The most effective strategy for preventing and managing these threats is source‑based monitoring and control—comprising large‑area surveillance and forecasting, widespread integrated pest management, and green pest‑control approaches.

Given the heavy workload of monitoring, forecasting, and control guidance, coupled with insufficient funding, there is an urgent need for financial support from the national budget. Therefore, it is recommended that the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs include the monitoring and control of major crop pests and diseases in their annual budgets and establish a dedicated fund for this purpose. This fund should be allocated to three key areas: pest and disease monitoring and forecasting; green control measures and integrated pest management to ensure effective prevention and control; and, in the case of integrated pest management, emergency relief efforts as well. In terms of resource allocation, priority should be given to regions where pest and disease outbreaks originate and to financially challenged border areas inhabited by ethnic minorities, so as to maximize the effectiveness of public funds.

Pei Chunliang, a deputy to the National People’s Congress and Party Secretary of Peizhai Village in Zhangcun Township, Huixian City, Henan Province, stated: The agricultural and rural sectors hold enormous potential for energy conservation and carbon reduction. Advancing carbon peaking and carbon neutrality in these fields is a key component of accelerating ecological civilization in agriculture and an important measure for implementing the rural revitalization strategy. As a major agricultural country, China must ensure that its efforts to achieve the “dual carbon” goals are seamlessly integrated with and coordinated alongside the rural revitalization strategy, thereby turning rural ecological revitalization into a new front for realizing these objectives and fostering mutual reinforcement and balanced development between rural revitalization and the dual carbon strategy.

Accordingly, we recommend accelerating the formulation and refinement of relevant policies and regulations and establishing collaborative innovation platforms. The “dual carbon” goals should be promptly integrated into the rural revitalization strategy, with the issuance of a development plan for peaking carbon emissions and achieving carbon neutrality in agriculture and rural areas. It is also essential to establish monitoring and evaluation systems and science‑and‑technology innovation platforms, strengthen cooperation among research institutions, extension services, educational bodies, producers, and processors, and ensure the effective implementation of the “dual carbon” objectives in the agricultural and rural sectors.

Source: Agricultural Inputs Herald