To develop modern agriculture, we must implement moderate land scale management. Zaozhuang has a population of 3.8 million, including 2.76 million in rural areas and 276 1 10,000 mu of cultivated land, with an average per capita of 0.73 mu. With a large population and little land, the task of improving land scale efficiency and increasing farmers' income in Zaozhuang City is even more arduous. After the third summer of 2008, I spent three months with relevant comrades to conduct a centralized investigation, visited 12 townships and 2 1 administrative villages successively, interviewed more than 400 farmers, and had many discussions with 16 experts, some cadres and the masses, and found out the basic situation of rural land scale management in Zaozhuang City. On this basis, in line with the wishes of farmers, starting with solving the key problems that restrict the scale operation of land, and taking revitalizing land capital as a breakthrough, the rural land use property right system was preliminarily reformed and explored.
First of all, land scale management calls for land capitalization.
30 years of reform and opening up in China and hundreds of years of experience in developed countries have proved that the basic ways for farmers to get rich are industrialization, urbanization and government subsidies. With the advancement of industrialization and urbanization, more and more farmers have left the land, and decentralized management based on household contract responsibility system has not adapted to the development of the situation. Although the proportion of agriculture in the national economy is getting smaller and smaller, its foundation and guarantee function have not been reduced at all, and food security is still the top priority. To ensure food security, first, we must maintain the corresponding scale of basic farmland and implement the strictest farmland protection system; The second is to increase the output per unit area, which involves mechanized farming, popularization of science and technology, standardized production and industrialized management. All these require large-scale land management.
According to our investigation, with the transfer of a large number of rural labor to secondary and tertiary industries, the phenomenon of land abandonment and semi-abandonment in Zaozhuang is more common; At the same time, some farmers are willing to expand the scale of land management. This has given birth to two phenomena: First, rural land circulation is frequent. At present, the land transfer area of Zaozhuang City is 235,000 mu, accounting for 8.6% of the city's cultivated land area. Second, a number of farmers' cooperative economic organizations with land as the link have emerged. Among them, there are 294 professional cooperatives with a scale of 60,000 mu of land. Although the agricultural cooperatives in Zaozhuang have mushroomed, many of them have encountered headache problems in the process of becoming bigger and stronger. Capital is the lifeblood of economic and agricultural cooperatives, and insufficient capital has become a bottleneck restricting cooperatives from becoming bigger and stronger.
There are four channels to solve the problem of funds: first, government funds, but at present, relying solely on financial input is a drop in the bucket. Second, farmers have their own funds, but the reality is that farmers are not rich and have little funds. The third is the funds of some urban investors. They invest in rural land, generally for projects and factories, which eventually leads to the reduction of cultivated land and the loss of land for farmers. The fourth is bank funds. At present, the four major commercial banks of industry, agriculture, China and construction, plus postal savings, and five powerful "pumps" continuously absorb funds from the countryside, but rarely return to the countryside; At the same time, the bank has a strict system, which stipulates that farmers can only borrow a small amount of money for joint household guarantee, and the period is short and the procedures are cumbersome. If you want to get a large loan, you must have a mortgage. For cooperatives and most farmers, the only mortgage value is land, but the current land system does not allow mortgage loans with contracted land. For example, Tengyang Selenium-rich Agricultural Products Cooperative in Tengzhou was lucky enough to get orders from Wal-Mart, Ginza and other large supermarkets, but it was difficult to get loans, so a good business fell through. For example, the Shanting Xuzhuang Land Cooperative has nearly 3,000 mu of land, but in any case, the bank does not provide loans. Banks have their own reasons: first, farmers have land without a license, and land cannot be mortgaged; Second, in the case of non-repayment at maturity, banks cannot take farmers and cannot apply for enforcement.
In the investigation, we found that the lack of funds in the development of cooperatives is also a common problem that restricts the development of cooperatives everywhere. In order to solve the bottleneck of funds, we must realize the mortgage function of rural land. Under this strong demand, the reform of land property right system is ready to come out.
Second, the key to land capitalization is to reform the land use property right system.
Thirty years ago, farmers in Xiaogang village in Anhui province contracted collective land for life and death, which started the rural reform in China. However, if the country does not implement the contract responsibility system for national joint production, it will be difficult to sing the drama in Xiaogang Village. Today, 30 years later, in the face of the booming land cooperatives but lack of funds, what the government should do is the focus of our thinking and research. First, farmers have contracted land for 30 years. Should the government issue them with certificates? The answer is yes. College graduates have graduation certificates, citizens have property certificates when buying houses, and farmers must of course have certificates that can prove their corresponding rights when contracting land. Secondly, what is the use of this certificate? This certificate can give farmers relatively complete land use property rights, including transfer rights, income rights and mortgages. In this way, farmers can use this certificate as an effective certificate for land transfer, income and mortgage. According to this idea, we launched a pilot project of rural land reform with the issuance of land use right certificates as the core.
(a) the issuance of land use property certificates
At the same time, the people's government at the county level will issue rural land use property certificates to farmers who have joined rural land cooperatives. We standardize this certificate as "three invariants" and "three guarantees". The "three invariants" are: first, the land ownership has not changed. What is traded and mortgaged is only the right to use the land, not the ownership, which has not changed the fundamental nature of the collective ownership of the land and the land has not been privatized. Second, farmers' contracting rights have not changed. The reform of property right system of land use right does not involve land contracting right. Although we have issued land use title certificates to farmers, the rural land contractual management right certificate has always been in the hands of farmers, and the main body of the contracting right is always farmers, which will not change because of the transfer of land use title certificates. Third, the nature of agricultural land has not changed. We stipulate that no matter who the land use right is transferred to, the grain field must grow grain, ensuring that the use of agricultural land will not change with the transfer. The "three guarantees" are: guaranteeing the circulation, income and mortgaged land of certified farmers. During the term of property rights, the holder may use, operate, transfer or transfer the land according to the prescribed purposes, or engage in share management, cooperative management or mortgage guarantee with the fixed price or converted shares as capital. After receiving the property right of the land use right, the land cooperative may apply to the land property right trading institution for the total property right certificate of the land use right with the property right certificate of all its members. Cooperatives can use land use property certificates to mortgage loans and finance to the financial sector to solve the problem of funds for large-scale operations.
At present, Tengzhou City and Shanting City of Zaozhuang City have issued 686 land use rights certificates to members of three rural land cooperatives, involving 4,560 mu of land. Take Shanting Xuzhuang Land Cooperative as an example. With the land as the mortgage, the cooperative borrowed 300,000 yuan from Shanting Rural Credit Union, with a loan period of 2 years. For example, Tengzhou Longzhu Jujube Professional Cooperative used the land as collateral to borrow 400,000 yuan from Tengzhou Rural Credit Cooperatives, with a loan period of 2 years. Through the mortgage loan of land use right certificate, farmers' land has become capital, and "death" has become "living money"
(B) the establishment of rural land use rights property rights trading market
Although farmers have land use right certificates, the three rights of land transfer, income and mortgage are only set in the legal sense; To make it a reality, there must be relevant supporting systems. In order to ensure the realization of land mortgage and avoid the risks brought by private transfer, we have established a three-level rural land use right property right trading network at city, district (city) and township (town). Municipal construction of "three rural" service center, district (city) construction of rural land use right property rights trading service center, township (town) construction of rural land use right property rights trading service center. Farmers, cooperatives or banks with land use property certificates can go to the land exchange for transactions; At the same time, the land exchange conducts an objective and fair evaluation of the land, providing reference prices for both parties to the transaction. In this way, a tangible market for the transaction of rural land use right property rights has been formed, and the problem of market vacancy that restricts the circulation of agricultural land has been solved.
(C) the development of rural land cooperatives
At present, we issue rural land use property certificates only to farmers who join land cooperatives, thus forming an interest-oriented mechanism and stimulating the development of land cooperatives. Because: first, farmers transfer land to cooperatives, not enterprises, and will not change the agricultural use of land. The second is to promote the transformation of all kinds of irregular and loose farmers' cooperative economic organizations into close land cooperatives with land as the link. Third, with the land use right certificate, the land can be evaluated objectively and fairly to ensure the interests of both parties to the transaction. Fourth, the land use title certificate can be used for mortgage loans, clearing the financial obstacles for cooperative production. At present, many land cooperatives have been established in Zaozhuang, and farmers' enthusiasm for joining cooperatives is very high, which has effectively promoted the scale management of land.
Third, do a good job in system design around avoiding the risk of farmers losing land.
In order to make the reform active and steady, we have fully learned from the experience and lessons of rural land system reform in other regions. At present, some explorations have been carried out in many parts of the country. Some places issue land ownership certificates to farmers, allowing them to trade contract rights or even part of ownership; Some places trade land tickets; Some places allow industrial and commercial capital to dominate rural land management. Although these explorations have realized land capitalization to varying degrees, they have caused changes in rural land ownership, farmers' contracting rights and the nature of agricultural land, which inevitably brought about problems such as farmers' land loss, rural stability and food security. In the process of reform, no matter the guiding ideology or the system design, we should try our best to avoid the risk of farmers losing their land.
(A) The two "80%" cooperatives have ensured farmers' effective control over the land.
We stipulate that the property right of land use right can only be invested in land cooperatives, but not in ordinary enterprises, because the Law of People's Republic of China (PRC) Farmers' Professional Cooperatives clearly stipulates that cooperatives adopt the system of one person, one vote, and the farmers in the basic members of cooperatives shall not be less than 80%, and the total number of additional voting rights obtained through capital contribution shall not exceed 20% of the total number of basic voting rights of cooperative members. This ensures that industrial and commercial capital cannot occupy a dominant position in land cooperatives, and farmers will not lose control of land.
(B) The introduction of agricultural insurance mechanism has greatly reduced the risk of mortgage of cooperative land use rights.
Agriculture is a relatively stable industry with low market risk, but cooperatives are still worried about encountering natural disasters and not paying loans. So we introduced the agricultural insurance mechanism into land cooperatives, and the government subsidized agricultural insurance. The introduction of this mechanism basically ensures the stability of cooperative agricultural management and minimizes the mortgage risk of cooperative land use property rights.
(C) "1/3" and "3 years" mortgage restrictions, so that farmers will not lose all their land for a long time.
We adopt the method of limited mortgage loan, and the land use property rights used by land cooperatives for mortgage loans are not all, but at most they do not exceed1/3; Even if this part of the land use right is forced to be mortgaged for auction because of poor management, farmers who join the cooperative still have most of the land use right. We also stipulate that the mortgage period of land use rights shall not exceed three years. Even if this part of the land use right is auctioned, it is only a short-term loss. When the deadline comes, the land use right will be returned to farmers, and farmers will not lose their land.
(4) The scale operation has good benefits and low risks, and the land use property rights of cooperatives have been effectively guaranteed.
Compared with the decentralized operation of one household, the cooperative scale operation has good economic benefits, more mortgaged assets, large loan amount and strong repayment ability, and banks are more willing to lend. Moreover, there are dozens and hundreds of cooperatives. Bank loans to cooperatives are equivalent to expanding the number of secured households, far exceeding the current number of joint households, and the loan risk is further reduced.
Fourth, respect the wishes of farmers and not "windy"
The reform of rural land use right property right system in Zaozhuang City is based on farmers' willingness to operate their land on a large scale and follows the principles of voluntariness, legality and compensation. On the one hand, it allows farmers to explore freely, on the other hand, it gives standardized guidance and help, and acts as a "director" behind the scenes instead of operating directly at the front desk, fully respecting farmers' wishes.
(A) the main driving force for reform comes from farmers, and the starting point is for farmers.
At present, the rural land system reform in some places is mostly carried out from top to bottom, and some are promoted by the government and developers, with the ultimate goal of pursuing the potential value-added benefits of land. The incentive of rural land reform in Zaozhuang city is mainly to pursue the scale management benefit of land, rather than the value-added benefit of transforming agricultural land into construction land.
(two) adhere to the word "stability" first, where conditions permit.
The reform in Zaozhuang City is not spread in a large area, but gradually pushed forward in some conditional land cooperatives. We didn't call on farmers to adopt this model in a short time, but designed a matching mechanism to encourage and guide those land that can be transferred conditionally to concentrate and carry out more efficient scale management. The process of farmland circulation should be gradual. What we value is not immediate, but long-term development. With the acceleration of industrialization and urbanization, more and more farmers are willing to take out their land for circulation in rural areas, and the soil and space for the reform of land use property rights system will become wider and wider.
The focus of the reform is on agricultural areas, not suburbs.
In some places, rural land reform is mainly concentrated in the urban-rural fringe, transforming agricultural land into construction land and changing land use, which has an impact on food security. Our reform pilot focuses on agricultural areas, the nature of agricultural land has not changed, agricultural production efficiency has improved, and food security has been guaranteed, which is of universal significance in China's vast agricultural areas.
The reform of rural land use right property right system in Zaozhuang city is not an isolated innovation, but a product of urban-rural overall planning and modern agricultural development. Crossing the river by feeling the stones is an exploration and attempt. This reform has just started, no matter in theory or in practice, there must be many shortcomings, and a lot of detailed basic work needs to be done. We will conscientiously sum up our experience and constantly explore and improve it to make it more operable.