Zhou Qisen: Improving Systems of Support for Strengthening, Benefiting, and Enriching Agriculture and Rural Areas
Systems concern the fundamental, stable, and long-term aspects of governance; comprehensively promoting rural revitalization is vital to national peace and public security. To advance the construction of a strong agricultural country through the modernization of agriculture and rural areas, particular attention must be paid to rural institutional development. The Third Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee made the strategic decision to "perfect supporting systems for strengthening agriculture, benefiting farmers, and enriching the peasantry." Recently, General Secretary Xi Jinping issued important instructions on "Three Rural" [1] work, requiring us to "further deepen rural reform, perfect supporting systems for strengthening agriculture, benefiting farmers, and enriching the peasantry, and comprehensively promote rural revitalization." To further deepen rural reform, we must adhere to major principles such as centering on the people and taking institutional development as the main thread. We must use an innovative spirit to perfect these systems and solidify the institutional foundation for building a strong agricultural country through the modernization of agriculture and rural areas.
1. Perfecting supporting systems for strengthening, benefiting, and enriching agriculture is an urgent need for building a strong agricultural country
As is well known, China's economic structural reform began in the countryside and achieved great success. This trajectory spans from the household contract responsibility system [2], which stimulated the enthusiasm of hundreds of millions of farmers, to the reform of rural taxes and fees which lightened the burden on the rural masses, to the construction of a new socialist countryside that fully released rural vitality, and finally to the implementation of the rural revitalization strategy that drives the vigorous development of the vast countryside. The tremendous achievements of rural reform fully demonstrate the advantages and power of institutional innovation, proving that sound systems are the foundational support for releasing rural vitality and maintaining strong developmental momentum.
Since the 18th CPC National Congress, the CPC Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core has based its actions on the overall situation of modernization, treating the resolution of the "Three Rural" issues as the "top priority" (重中之重) of the entire Party’s work. By adhering to the priority development of agriculture and rural areas, the Party’s rural systems have been continuously perfected, and measures to "fix weak links and strengthen deficiencies" have continued to exert force. Consequently, China's comprehensive agricultural production capacity has reached a new level, rural livelihoods have improved significantly, and the rural landscape has taken on a completely new look. Fundamentally, this is an expression of our Party’s continuous deepening of rural institutional development and promotion of high-quality development in rural areas. It is the inevitable result of the CPC Central Committee’s response to the call of the times to constantly strengthen and perfect modern rural institutional development centered on strengthening, benefiting, and enriching agriculture. Under the new situation, we must further and comprehensively deepen reform, implement the rural revitalization strategy in depth, and take institutional integration and innovation as a breakthrough point. By focusing on strengthening, benefiting, and enriching agriculture, and tackling the key and difficult points of rural institutional development, we can fortify the institutional roots for building a strong agricultural country and ensure that Chinese-path modernization moves forward steadily and reaches far.
Perfecting the supporting systems for strengthening, benefiting, and enriching agriculture is an inevitable requirement for the comprehensive implementation of the rural revitalization strategy. The construction of this system covers agriculture, rural areas, and farmers; it links industry, ecology, and culture; and it involves development, governance, and people’s livelihoods. It is a systemic project to advance the construction of a strong agricultural country through agricultural and rural modernization. Its basic logic is to realize the beautiful vision of strong agriculture, wealthy farmers, and beautiful villages by establishing high-quality and high-efficiency modern agriculture, building a "livable, business-friendly, and beautiful countryside" [3], and cultivating a "new type of farmer" who is rich in both "pocket and mind." The clear proposal of the Third Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee to "perfect supporting systems for strengthening agriculture, benefiting farmers, and enriching the peasantry" is a practical necessity of the Party leading the peasant masses to advance agricultural and rural modernization. It elevates our Party’s regular understanding of "Three Rural" work to a new height. For China to be strong, its agriculture must be strong; for China to be beautiful, its countryside must be beautiful; for China to be rich, its farmers must be rich. To comprehensively implement the rural revitalization strategy, we must follow the requirements of high-quality development, strengthen institutional safeguards, promote inclusive balance, and facilitate the comprehensive upgrading of agriculture, the comprehensive progress of rural areas, and the comprehensive development of farmers.
Perfecting these supporting systems is also an urgent need to resolve the realistic contradictions in agricultural and rural development at the current stage. General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized that the fundamental way to resolve the various contradictions and problems facing agricultural and rural development lies in deepening reform. Since the 18th CPC National Congress, the CPC Central Committee has adopted a series of effective policy measures around advancing agricultural and rural modernization, driving all-around changes in the rural landscape. At the same time, we must soberly realize that current rural reform and development still face many new situations and challenges. For example, the institutional foundation for the effective transition between consolidating and expanding the achievements of poverty alleviation and rural revitalization still needs to be solidified; the task of assisting low-income rural populations remains arduous; and the difficulties and "short boards" [4] of agricultural and rural modernization remain prominent. Responding to these challenges places new and higher demands on further deepening rural reform and perfecting supporting systems.
2. Perfecting supporting systems for strengthening, benefiting, and enriching agriculture must give play to the farmers’ role as the principal actors
Rural revitalization is for the farmers, relies on the farmers, and its fruits are shared by the farmers; this is the fundamental concept of our Party throughout rural reform and development. Farmers are the principal actors (主体) of rural revitalization; whether rural revitalization can be realized as scheduled depends fundamentally on the farmers. The practical exploration and experience accumulated by farmers are the "living source" (活水源头) for perfecting these supporting systems. We must respect the "pioneering spirit of the farmers" [5], work on policy integration, institutional improvement, and smooth mechanisms, and use a more democratic and scientific system-forming mechanism to pool the synergy of institutional development. We must let farmers play the "leading role" and "shoulder the heavy burdens" in the construction of these systems.
Adhere to the positioning of farmers as the primary beneficiaries of reform and effectively protect their fundamental interests. Material interest is the inductive force for endogenous institutional change. Perfecting supporting systems requires taking the maintenance, realization, and development of the fundamental interests of farmers as the starting point and source of power. The key lies in implementing policy measures. First, optimize the supply of agriculture-related policies, perfect mechanisms that benefit farmers, build agricultural development chains, maintain steady growth in farmers' income, and narrow the urban-rural gap. Second, maintain the "top priority" status of "Three Rural" work, establish an interest protection mechanism for grain production entities, improve the system of rural preferential subsidies, stimulate farmers' enthusiasm for grain cultivation, and ensure national food security. Third, perfect the rural protection system centered on basic livelihood guarantees, improve mechanisms for infrastructure and public services, and enhance the level of rural construction to strengthen farmers' sense of gain in an all-around way.
Adhere to the logic of farmers as the principal actors of rural development and explore various effective agricultural economic organizations, management forms, and operating mechanisms. Since the beginning of reform and opening up, it is precisely because our Party fully respected the initiative and pioneering spirit of hundreds of millions of farmers—and timely elevated their experiences into policies and solidified them into systems—that rural reform and development gained continuous momentum. In the process of transforming agriculture toward modernization, exploring a set of agricultural systems that effectively link smallholders with modern agriculture and suit China's national and agricultural conditions is of great significance. This will stimulate the endogenous motivation of farmers to manage and use collective assets well, which is crucial for the development of productive forces, the improvement of comprehensive agricultural efficiency, and the growth of farmers' income. This should become the focus and direction of rural institutional reform.
Adhere to the logic of farmers as the principal actors of rural governance and perfect a rural governance model based on "joint contribution, social governance, and shared benefits." Perfecting the social governance system based on joint contribution, social governance, and shared benefits is an important deployment of the Third Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee. The concrete manifestation of farmer subjectivity in social governance is to uphold their primary status in rural governance and build a governance system that combines self-governance, the rule of law, and the rule of virtue. Through institutional improvement, we should stimulate the enthusiasm and energy of hundreds of millions of farmers to care for, love, and build their homes. We should encourage them to immerse themselves in rural governance with a spirit of practice and exploration, thereby enhancing the efficacy of rural governance.
3. The focal points for perfecting supporting systems for strengthening, benefiting, and enriching agriculture
Based on institutional development, the Third Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee made all-around deployments in terms of perfecting the agricultural investment mechanism, optimizing the agricultural subsidy policy system, improving the long-term management mechanism for assets created by national poverty alleviation investment, and perfecting long-term mechanisms for promoting comprehensive rural revitalization.
Further perfect systems for strengthening agriculture and continuously activate the endogenous power of rural revitalization. Rural revitalization requires both "shaping the form" (塑形) and "casting the soul" (铸魂) [6]. Perfecting these systems requires not only increasing policy support for economic development—to guide the equal and rational flow of resource elements to the countryside and narrow the urban-rural gap—but also taking more institutional measures in spiritual and cultural terms. We must lean toward the countryside with greater policy intensity and more efficient operating mechanisms. We must continuously and deeply carry out the construction of "civilized rural customs" (乡风文明) and eliminate obsolete and backward thoughts and behaviors. By implementing the "Civilized Rural Customs Construction Project," we can strengthen the ideological and moral development of farmers, promote and practice Socialist Core Values, and make full use of New Era Civilization Practice Centers [7] and village libraries. By organizing diversified cultural and sports activities, we can foster good social fashions, vigorously cultivate rural civilization, and inject a steady stream of spiritual power into rural spiritual civilization construction.
Further perfect systems for benefiting farmers and promote the inclusive and balanced distribution of rural public services. It should be noted that rural infrastructure—including roads, water, electricity, gas, logistics, communications, and sanitation—still faces problems such as "emphasizing construction over maintenance" and "emphasizing use over management." Rural public services—including education, healthcare, elder care, poverty assistance, and disability support—still face issues of low quality and imbalance. These must be resolved through strengthened institutional development. To this end, we must perfect the guarantee mechanism for basic rural public services. By establishing sound systems for rural infrastructure construction and policy matching, we can build a coordinated system for the "construction, use, management, and maintenance" of rural infrastructure and public services, continuously improving the rural living environment. We must move toward the institutionalization and legalization of rural public service equalization, ensuring farmers live more comfortably, travel more smoothly, and have a stronger sense of gain, happiness, and security.
Further perfect systems for enriching the peasantry and promote the development of rural industries. General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out that the key to rural revitalization lies in industrial revitalization. The prerequisite for enriching the peasantry is accelerating the development of rural industries, cultivating new industries and business models, opening "new tracks" for rural economic development, increasing farmers' income through multiple channels, and strengthening the collective economy through various measures. We must improve the promotion mechanism for "enriching-the-people" industries at the county level. By combining market-based means with policy incentives, we can guide and support rural industry, smooth the channels for urban-rural integration, and promote the free flow and equal exchange of factors, building a vibrant industrial ecosystem. We must guide farmers to leverage local advantages and do a good job with the "local specialty" (土特产) article [8]. This involves vigorously developing green food, characteristic agricultural products, the integration of agriculture-culture-tourism, and the health and wellness industries. We should create an institutional environment for a county-level economy that features complete industrial chains, reasonable value chains, and urban-rural linkage, thereby diversifying the channels for increasing farmers' income.