In 2015, faced with complicated and grim domestic and international economic situation, the CPC Central Committee and the State Council, according to the general logic of stabilizing improvement, adjusting agriculture structures, enhancing agricultural reform and benefiting the people's livelihood, correctly held the facts that the overall agro-production cost is increasing, the international and national agriculture price gap is broadening, the national agriculture resources are in deficit, the rural social structure is changing, and the urban and rural resources are exchanging rapidly, took reform as fundamental driving force, acted on the national and agricultural conditions and the time's demand, promoted the support for rural reform and policies, enhanced the role of science and technology, sped up the construction of new-type agricultural operative system that features intensification, specialization, organization, and socialization, further optimized the support and protection of agriculture, and constantly strengthened agriculture, benefited the rural areas and created more income for farmers.
The efforts to empower, benefit and enrich the people were strengthened. In 2015, the national budget for agriculture, forestry and water conservancy was 651.27 billion yuan, among which, 66.06 billion yuan was spent on the central government level, and 585.21 billion yuan was transferred and spent on the local level. The efforts to empower, benefit and enrich the people saw achievements, and the nation's agro sciences and technology progress and facility improvement saw acceleration, which provided strong support for a successive twelve-year increase for food production.
The basic rural operation system was further consolidated and improved. The pilot project for the confirmation, registration and issuance of certificates on the contracted management rights of rural land was steadily promoted. In 2015, the pilot program was expanded on a provincial level. On top of the three provinces selected in 2014 (Shandong, Sichuan and Anhui provinces), the provincial-level pilot program was expanded to Jiangsu, Shanxi, Hubei, Hunan, Gansu, Ningxia, Jilin, Guizhou, Henan provinces (and autonomous region). Other provinces expanded their county-level pilot programs based on provincial situation and development. Until the end of 2015, the pilot program was conducted in 2,323 counties (cities, districts), 24,000 townships, and 385,000 administrative villages, covering 46 million hectares based on actual measurement, among which 31.33 million hectares were certificated, registered and issued measurement. Efforts such as promoting and researching exemplar counties in rural collective "three resources" management and regulating rural finance management set solid foundations for protecting rural collective economy and farmers, rights, and for enhancing a harmonious and stable rural society.
Agricultural scale operation developed fast. Under the premises of collective ownership of land, MoA realized the separation of land ownership right, contract right and management right, led an orderly transfer of management right, hatched new agricultural business entities, developed various forms of moderate-scale agricultural operations, improved moderate-scale innovations of rural agricultural land system and agricultural operation system. Influenced by multiple factors including increased work force transfer, the promising future of high-quality, high-efficiency agriculture and all-level governments, strong support, rural land circulation was accelerating, farmers5 land contract mechanism was preliminarily established, scale operation was developed fast, which realized concentrated and adjacent plantation and intensive, scale operation, reduced cost, benefited agriculture development and farmers' income. Until the end of 2015, national household contracted and managed circulated farmland had reached 29.53 million hectares, which took up 33.3 percent of total contracted land of households.
Rural comprehensive reform was deeply promoted. MoA explored around issues such as cultivating new operation entities, perfecting the interconnected benefit system among various operation entities and innovating agricultural social services, and was working on constructing modern agricultural operating system. Efforts such as establishing the rights and certification of rural land, detailing the management powers and functions of contracted rural land, regulating land circulation management greatly improved and perfected rural land management. The modern rural financial system also vigorously established by efforts in advancing rural financial service system, bordering the ranges of effective collateral, setting up rural credit system, launching inner credit cooperation in rural cooperatives and bettering rural insurance policies. The rural collective property rights reform was deepened by efforts in quantifying rural collective-owned property rights, operation and management of new collective business entities and rural property transfer policies. The urban-rural integration mechanism was advanced by explorations in balancing urban and rural development, promoting household registration reform, equalizing urban and rural public services, forming industry-agriculture benefiting relationships and strengthening agricultural support and protection system. The rural governance system was improved by making explorations in vivid, robust villager autonomy and democratic decisionmaking mechanism.
The systematic reform of seed industry was deepened. Since 2015, local authorities had earnestly practiced the guiding principles established by the third, fourth and fifth plenary sessions of the 18th CPC Central Committee and the State Council, and actively shouldered responsibilities, overcame difficulties, joint forces to promote seed industry reform and mechanism innovation. Solid progress had been made in seed scientific research benefit pilot programs, and new development had been made in constructing national-level seed incubation and production bases. Substantial progress was made in com and soybean fine seed joint research, and supportive policies for company innovation was strengthened, and prominent, interim success had been achieved, which brought new vitality to the development of modern seed industry.
The regulation mechanism of agricultural product market was improved. In 2015，MoA continued to implement policy of lowest purchasing price for wheat and rice, and the purchasing price for wheat and rice remained the same from 2014. The temporary purchasing and storage policy for important agricultural products, such as corn, was improved, which benefited the balanced development of both upstream and downstream of corn industry chain. The target price reform pilot programs for cotton in Xinjiang, and soybean from northeast China and Inner Mongolia continued; the average target price for Xinjiang cotton was 19,100 yuan per ton, 700 yuan lower than that of previous year. The soybean from northeast China and Inner Mongolia was 4,800 yuan per ton, the same as 2014. MoA also established agricultural product market early warning system, hosted agriculture outlook conference, published agriculture market supply and demand information, and further strengthened agriculture information monitoring, early warning and releasing.
The agricultural technical popularization system reform gained positive outcomes. During 2012 to 2015, the central budget devoted 2.6 billion yuan each year to subsidize the national grassroots agricultural technology promotion reform and construction in 2,550 agricultural villages. Local finance also invested about 10 billion yuan to support rural technical promotion. Currently the nation has established 79,000 national agricultural technology promotion entities, with 600,000 approved budgeted staffs, and 580,000 actual technical promotion staffs. Farmers' cooperatives, family farms and agriculture related companies and social organizations have gradually grown to be important drivers for agricultural technology promotion, agriculture research institutions and universities as sources of technology development and achievement have also played increasingly important roles.
The national public service for rural migrant workers was gradually improved. The labor departments of all regions further serviced migrant farmers well under the new circumstances, which laid a solid foundation for the realization of migrant farmers' integration into the city and citizenization. Governments of all levels concentrated on stabilizing and broadening migrant farmers' employment and entrepreneurship opportunities, increasing migrant farmers' job training, accelerating their integration into the society, and further improving the governments' leading impact on migrant farmers' employment. In 2015, the country had a total of 277.47 million rural migrant workers, increasing by 1.3 percent than 2014.
The agricultural rules and laws were further promoted. Centered around the goals of developing and protecting agriculture according to law, MoA actively explored and engaged in improving legislation, regulating law enforcement and resolving conflicts. MoA also emphasized on agricultural legislation investigation and drafting, and designed and published MoA's Guiding Opinions on Implementing the Spirits of the CPC Fourth Plenary Session of the 18th Central Committee and Strengthening the Construction of Agricultural Legal System. MoA actively promoted agricultural legislations and regulations construction and legislations and regulations in other important areas to strengthened legal support for agricultural development. MoA also further standardized and increased agricultural law enforcement, expanded legal services, and effectively protected the order of agricultural production and operation as well as farmers' legal rights and benefits.
