1. Policy backgrounder and main content
In 2013, to implement the spirits of the 3rd Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee to promote the management of rural collective assets and finances, efforts have been made to issue the document that required to improve and standardize the rural finance management, comprehensively clean and monitor the rural collective assets, actively promote rural collective assets supervision platform construction. These efforts have achieved remarkable results, as they have set firm foundation for further inspiring agro and rural inner development vitality, and speeding up the construction of rural and urban integration development mechanism.
1) To advance and standardize the village finance management The village finance management is the important foundation and guarantee for using rural collective asset resources, developing collective economy, and legally protecting farmers’ distribution rights. In recent years, all the areas have seriously implemented the central government^ policies of advancing village finance management, so as to improve the institution, strengthen measures, so as to advance village financial management. However, the village financial management in some areas has still been weak, and financial disorder has been a target of farmers5 complaint, as some areas’ accounting has been unclear, financial disclosure has been but mere formality, and other lacking of audit supervision. In 2013, the Ministry of Agriculture has worked with other departments to issue the ideas of further advancing and standardize the village financial management, which has clearly pointed out that efforts should be made to implement the village accounting work, improve the democratic supervision mechanism of village finance, stabilize and advance the rural accounting team building. Currently the national has seen almost half of all the provinces transmit the document, and further strengthened the standardization construction of rural financial management.
2) The verification and evaluation of national rural collective-owned asset has been comprehensively finished The rural collective-owned asset, the important material basis of developing rural economy and realizing the farmers’ common wealth, is of importance to develop the collective economy, advance the service of collective economy, and increase the farmers’ property income. According to the No. 1 document of the central government and its arrangement of strengthening the clean governance in rural areas, efforts have been made to get to the rural collective-owned asset, liquidize the rural collective-owned asset, and to verify and evaluate the national rural collective-owned asset since 2010, a new round of comprehensive evaluation since 1997. In 2013, the Ministry of Agriculture has conducted monitoring and supervision of the rural collective-owned asset verification and evaluation work in 29 provinces (except for Guizhou and Tibet), which has covered 592.4 thousand villages, among which 93 percent have finished the work. Hence the rural collective-owned asset has been evaluated.
3) The platform construction of rural collective assets management has been actively promoted The development of a supervision and management system for rural collective assets, finances and resources has been accelerated. The acceleration of such platform is an important way to increase the management and efficiency of rural collective assets. But currently the informatization level of the management regime is still lagging behind, as 45 percent villages have not realized accounting computerization, but using traditional manual efforts to account and register assets and ledger. It is the historical necessity to gradually realize the informatized management of rural collective assets, so as to allow farmers get easy access to rural finance and other affairs, take part in the management, and practice their legal rights. In 2013, the Ministry of Agriculture has actively researched the construction, software design and usage of the management centers and information monitoring platform of rural collective assets, put forward the basic construction framework of rural collective assets management, and worked to include the construction into the ministry’s second phase of the Golden Farming Project and E-Farming Plan.
2. Policy implementation and effect evaluation
1) Efforts have been made to get to the rural collective-owned asset, setting the foundation for property rights classification. Right now the rural collective-owned asset has three features. The first is the large scale. The whole asset is 2 178.63 billion yuan, with 3.693 million yuan per village, a 1.3-time increase than 2013, with the annual increase of 9.7 percent for 9 year. The second is the diversified structure. The fixed asset, monetary capital and accounts receivable have taken over 87.1 percent of the whole asset, and the other 12.9 percent of asset is long and short-term investment, inventory and agro asset, among which the fixed asset is the highest, accounting for 47.1 percent, with the 1.03 times increase than 2003. The third is the remarkable regional difference. China’s rural collective-owned asset has now 75.9 percent in eastern region, 16.9 percent in central region and 7.2 percent in western region. So the asset per village in eastern region is 4 times and 6 times of the central and the west regions respectively. All in all, currently the rural collective-owned asset has been clear, which has no only helped liquidize the asset, but also set solid foundation for further deepening the reform of rural collective property system, and defining the ownership of collective-owned asset.
2) Efforts have been made to improve the regulations and further standardize the asset financial management. All the regions have, based on the verification and evaluation of national rural collective-owned asset, has endeavored to implement the ministries’ requirements in the documents, by practically establishing and improving relative regulations, and further standardizing the rural collective-owned asset and financial management. Counties and townships of Beijing, Shanghai, Jiangsu and Gansu have strictly demanded that all the incomes and expenses have to get real, legal and valid receipt, and the expenses have to go through democratic procedures and approval. The hand-off, renting and transfer of rural collective welfare projects and collective-owned assets and resources must have bidding process. Areas like Guangdong, Zhejiang and Hunan have included the rural collective-owned assets and resources into the information management platform of rural collective "three-funded enterprises"，so as to realize open trade, and have set up trade rules and accountability system.
3) Efforts have been made to build the management platform, so as to further improve the asset financial management. All the areas have established the rural collective-owned assets information monitoring system, featuring by level-management, real-time supervision, warning and correction, data sharing and information service, so as to comprehensively increase the supervision level of rural collective-owned assets monitoring. Till the June, 2013, the whole country has invested 1.53 billion yuan to support the informatized management platform construction of rural collective assets, which has helped the establishment of supervision platforms of 7 province-level ones, 85 city-level one and 1570 county-level ones. The province-to-village network management has been realized in Beijing, Shanghai and Heilongjiang, so as to standardize the rural collective-owned asset management, and increase the information level.
4) Efforts have been made to harmonize the relations between cadres and the masses, so as to further secure the harmony and stability of rural society. Lack of transparency and standardization in rural collective-owned assets management is an important factor to trigger the farmers’ group petition, at the cost of worsening cadres-masses relations. The advancement of the financial management of collective-owned assets will, reduce the farmers’ doubts and defuse the cadres-masses conflicts on one hand, and inspire the masses to take part in the monitoring and management of collective-owned assets, promote the rural collective economy, and defend the property interests on the other. The farmers’ role of democratic supervisors has been further displayed, as the post supervision before has been transformed into all-way supervision, which has standardized the village cadres’ behavior, prevent the village grassroots corruption by the root of institution, and given the transparency to both the masses and the cadres, so as to promote the construction of a clean and honest CPC Party in rural areas.
