Xi Yanchun (host):
Ladies and gentlemen, good morning. Welcome to the policy briefing of the State Council. The executive meeting held this week passed a plan on agricultural modernization and decided to streamline the approval management of foreign enterprises.
Today, we’re glad to be joined by Yu Xinrong, vice minister of the Ministry of Agriculture, and Qiu Tianchao from the Department of Rural Economy of the National Development and Reform Commission. Mr. Yu will give more information about the plan.
We are also pleased to invite Tong Daochi, assistant minister of the Ministry of Commerce. He will talk about issues about streamlining approval management of foreign enterprises and take your questions. Let’s give the floor to Mr. Yu.
Yu Xinrong:
Ladies and gentlemen, good morning. As the foundation and support to China’s modernization, agricultural modernization is the future direction concerning food security, farm product supply and well-off life of farmers. The Party Central Committee and the State Council have attached great importance to development of modern agriculture, and issued a modernization plan (2016-2020) on Oct 8, a guideline for China’s agriculture in the next five years.
The plan was drafted by the Ministry of Agriculture, the National Development and Reform Commission, and other related departments, and covers the development trend, strategies, guiding ideas, basic principles, goals, and tasks, as well as key projects, polices, and guarantee measures.
According to the plan, agriculture modernization will center on efficiency, quality and competitiveness improvement to promote the supply-side reform during the 13th Five-Year period. Diversified operation with proper scale will lead agricultural transformation to build the industrial, production and operation system for modern agriculture. This will guarantee effective supply of safe farm products, improve farmers’ incomes, and pave the way for sustainable, efficient, resource-saving and environment-friendly modern agriculture.
Yu Xinrong:
The plan pinpointed that agricultural modernization will make obvious progress during the 13th Five-Year period with effective food security guarantee and better quality and efficiency of product supply. Meanwhile, we will improve the international competitiveness of our agricultural industry to bring well-off life to farmers and create a beautiful countryside.
According to the plan, agricultural modernization will be basically achieved first in developed areas along the eastern coastline, suburbs of large cities, state-owned arable land, and national demonstration areas.
Yu Xinrong:
The plan puts forward five tasks. The first task is to promote innovation for agricultural upgrading, with the innovation fixed on system and mechanism, and technology. Efforts will be made to improve the basic rural operation system, guide farmers to transfer their land-use rights on their wills, and develop various types of moderate-scale management.
We will also help enhance the supporting capacity of technology and equipment, and strengthen the safety assurance of agricultural products.
The second task is to promote the balanced development of agriculture. We will help promote integrative development among primary, secondary and tertiary industries, with a focus on the development of the agricultural product processing industry, e-commerce and agritourism.
The task stresses the need for optimizing regional structures, aimed at establishing an agricultural productivity layout suitable for each region’s resources and environmental carrying capacity. We will also make efforts to grow new-type entities and professional farmers.
Yu Xinrong:
The third task is to develop green agriculture. With a view to saving resources, protecting the environment and securing quality, we are calling for the establishment of major projects to develop green agriculture.
It requires strict institutional management on the use of fertilizer, pesticides and feed additives, the reutilization and safety disposal of agricultural wastes, the prevention of area-pollution, and supervision of the quality and safety of agricultural products.
The fourth task is to help expand cooperation with outside areas. Taking advantage of domestic and overseas markets and resources, we will help optimize the layout of external cooperation, enhance the level of cooperation and promote the healthy development of the trade of agricultural products.
The fifth task is to improve farmers’ livelihoods and well-being, with a focus on poverty-alleviation by promoting related industries targeting certain regions.
To fulfill the task, we will also make efforts to build a mechanism for the stable increase of financial investment, expand the channels for social capital going into the market, optimize agricultural subsidy policies, and conduct innovation in credit and insurance services.
In addition, we’re calling for coordinated development between agricultural modernization and new-type urbanization.
Actually, we already have a clear timetable and road map for the 13th Five-Year Plan in agriculture. The Ministry of Agriculture and other departments will work hard to put it in place. Thanks.
Xi Yanchun:
Thank you, Mr. Yu. Now, Mr. Tong Daochi, please.
Tong Daochi:
Media friends, good afternoon. The executive meeting of the State Council on October 8 decided that for foreign enterprises not involved in access regulations approved by the State Council, the founding and changes of such enterprises should be subject to a recording system instead of administrative approval. Let me make an introduction about the background of the policy.
Absorbing foreign investment is an integral part of China’s national policy of opening up. And we have made incredible advancements on it from the beginning of China’s economic reform.
As China’s leadership is trying to build a more open economy, the party has announced guidelines to reform the approval procedure of foreign investment. In particular, placing foreign companies on an equal footing with other enterprises when entering China and setting up a negative list management system.
Another important factor this time is that legal authorization by the People’s Congress for the pilot reform in the four Free Trade Zones (FTZ) expired on September 30 this year, so a new policy should be proposed in accordance to the new authorization.
The reform in the four Free Trade Zones has been widely acknowledged because it has simplified the registration procedure for foreign corporations, creating a convenient and international business environment for businessmen.
Tong Daochi:
Recently, the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress has passed four amendments to the law, clarifying two items. First, the registration of enterprises not included in the special market entry list will be subject to record-filing management instead of government approval. Second, the special market entry management measures will be published or approved by the State Council.
In the four Free Trade Zones, where the reform has been conducted as an experiment, the special market entry management measures refer to a negative list.
According to amendments by the People’s Congress, the approval procedure reforms will be expanded to the whole country from the four FTZs, which is a big step.
On October 8, the Ministry of Commerce and National Development and Reform Commission issued a regulation, detailing the special market entries.
Xi Yanchun:
Thank you, Mr Yu. Now, Mr Tong, please.
Tong Daochi:
To implement reform of the administrative approval system of foreign-invested enterprises, we made the following efforts: first, we published an announcement which clearly defined the special administrative measures and the catalogue in 2015 regarding foreign-invested industries as a transitional guideline; second, we published on the internet the record measures regarding establishment of foreign-invested enterprises.
According to the new measures, burdens of enterprises will be substantially reduced as foreign-invested enterprises are only required to submit certain information and file for record to be established under the context that they are not involved with specially-regulated industries. In addition, there are clear stipulations about when to file for record on the internet, which greatly simplifies the procedure. It is estimated that 90 percent of paper will be reduced in the simplified procedure compared with the former one. Considering this, the new procedure also makes a contribution to environment protection. Furthermore, in the past you need to wait for 20 more days to go through the whole procedure but now you only have to take three days to get things done. The focus of the reform is information provided by enterprises and continuing regulation on them.
Based on the experiences of free trade pilot zones, we upgraded the information system to accommodate with the online declaration system, which will provide convenience for foreign-invested enterprises to file for record. Up to Oct 13, more than 500 applications to establish foreign-invested enterprises have been received nationwide and 134 applications have been finished; 1,100 applications for alteration have been received and 285 of them have been filed for record.
Tong Daochi:
The ultimate goal of foreign investment system reform is to fully implement the pre-establishment national treatment and negative list, creating a fair investing environment for foreign-invested enterprises. The purpose of such policies is to treat equally domestic and foreign enterprises. This is a major decision made by the central government.
Under the current global economic situation, investment momentum of all countries is weak. According to international estimation, direct foreign investment around the world will fall 10 to 15 percent. Under such circumstance, we have to further streamline approval system of foreign investment, create a better investment environment and attract more foreign investment, advancing China’s economic reform and development.
Xi Yanchun:
Thanks for Mr. Tong’s introduction. Now it’s the time for questions.
CRI (China Radio International)
The modernization of agriculture is not a new subject and we also know that a plan on the modernization of agriculture has been rolled out during the “12th Five Year plan”. So Mr Yu, to what extent has the plan been carried out until now? And what are the new characteristics of this new plan compared to the old one introduced during”12th Five Year plan”?
Yu Xinrong
This question is to compare the two plans from a historic perspective. Good question. Through five years implementation after the State Council released the plan on modernization development on agriculture nationwide, all the objectives have been completed while some major indicators such as grain production capacity, farmers’ income, contribution rate of the agricultural technology, which reflected the progress made in the modernization, were achieved ahead of schedule. All these achievements made during the 12th Five Year plan period have laid a solid foundation for the new plan in the 13th Five year plan period.
This plan has maintained the continuity from the old one and also highlighted new requirements and made a series of new arrangements according to a set of policies released since the 18th CPC National Congress.
First is to carry out the new development concept. The plan will implement the innovative, coordinative, green, open and sharing developing concepts put forward at the Fifth Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee in the process of agricultural modernization.
Second is to implement the supply-side reform. The plan focuses on destocking, lowering cost and strengthening weak links so as to promote agricultural structure upgrading and development transformation.
Third is to emphasize rules to be followed. Modern agriculture should follow some basic rules such as implementing national food safety strategies, stressing green development, national ecological safety and improvement of agricultural product quality.
In addition, the new plan has additional features on its objectives.
First is to attach importance to structural adjustment. The plan added new indicator of structural adjustments ratios of stock raising, agricultural product processing industry and agricultural output ratio.
Second is to further emphasize sustainable development. The development of modern agriculture cannot be at the cost of ecological balance. So the new plan contains another 7 indicators for green development.
Third is to further provide support and protection for agriculture. It raised the concept of public financial expense on agriculture and agricultural insurance coverage indicator for the first time.
I believe the agriculture modernization development plan for the next five years will help China to realize an overall well-off society.
China National Radio:
My question is for Mr. Tong. Last January, the Ministry of Commerce released a draft concerning foreign investment law for public opinions. What effects will the amendment of the four regulations, such as foreign enterprise law, bring to the legislative process of the foreign investment law? Will the ministry continue to promote and introduce a national foreign investment law in the next stage?
Tong Daochi:
The ministry has carried out legislation work concerning foreign investment in accordance with legislation programs of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress and the legislation plans of the State Council. On January 2015, the draft of the foreign investment law was released to the public.
On Sept 3 2016, the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress revised such regulations as foreign enterprise law, which is a special work relating to law amendment. It is different from the requirements of introducing a basic foreign investment law. Such special amendment work only concerns administrative items with a clear legal task – solving the issue of the legal authorization expiration of the Shanghai Pilot Free Trade Zone and promoting such free trade zones nationwide.
However, the amendment of the four regulations is not a comprehensive one and in the next stage a national foreign investment law will be introduced to enhance foreign investment system reform.
The comprehensive amendments of the three foreign investment regulations and formulation of a national foreign investment law mean not only modifying related administrative items but also linking rules of enterprise organizations and management structure in the three regulations with the rules and regulations of corporation law. Meanwhile, the target of such regulations should be adjusted to investment behaviors of foreign investors in China, in aims to realize the transformation of foreign investment enterprise law to the foreign investment management law. Therefore, it is still necessary to comprehensively modify the three regulations. We will continue to promote the revision of the three regulations and the legislative process of the foreign investment law, striving for an early introduction.
China Daily
My question is for Mr. Yu. China’s agriculture has been reaping a continuous harvest in recent years, but there are structural problems, including the mismatch of supply and demand and higher output not accompanied by a higher income. The central government has put forward measures in deepening supply-side structural reforms in agriculture. What arrangements did the plan make concerning this aspect? Thanks.
Yu Xinrong:
As you have mentioned, China has indeed made remarkable achievements in agricultural modernization, with the integration of domestic and international markets and resources. But we have to confront new problems now, such as agricultural production unable to meet the changes in people’s consumption habit and increasingly prominent structural imbalance between supply and demand of agricultural products. In the past, we had to focus on how to feed our people with enough food, but now we should make efforts to let the people enjoy a good and healthy diet. This puts forward new requirement for agricultural development.
At the national legislature’s annual session this year, President Xi Jinping stressed that promoting supply-side structural reforms in agriculture, and enhancing the overall profits and competitiveness of agriculture is the keynote of China’s agricultural policy at present and in the future.
Centered on deepening supply-side structural reforms in agriculture during the 13th Five-Year Plan, the national plan spelled out measures in adjusting structure, destocking inventory, reducing cost, and strengthening weak links. For instance, in terms of structural adjustment, it decided to promote the structural adjustment of farming with corn as the focus, adjustment of animal husbandry with pigs and herbivores as the center, and adjustment of fishery with the aim of protecting resources, and less fishing volume with increased income. In terms of destocking inventory, it proposed to promote the integrated development of agricultural production and agricultural products processing industry. As for cost reduction, it decided to develop varied moderate scale businesses with system innovations to improve efficiency and reduce labor costs, highlighting a green development with the reduction in the use of fertilizers and pesticides. In terms of strengthening weak links, agricultural infrastructure construction will be strengthened to improve the mechanization and informatization level, and develop eco-friendly agriculture. Thank you.
Reuters:
Here’s a question about agriculture. Our government is making more efforts to control agricultural pollution, especially pollution by pig farms. However, we can still see reports about local residents complaining about the pollution by pig farms. So what measures will the government take to solve the problem? Besides closing down pig farms, are there any new technologies we can use to help farmers solve the problem?
Yu Xinrong:
First, we do not simply close down pig farms, but optimize the layout of pig raising according to local situations. Regarding your question, the document recommended certain arrangements, recommending that agricultural waste be used as resources.
Specifically, efforts will be made in the following aspects: First is to promote standardized production and improve scientific breeding level. Second is to adjust and optimize regional layouts - the key is to reduce the pig raising scale in South China’s areas with rich water resources, and guide the transfer to maize production areas or areas with bigger environmental capacity. Third is to further promote technological innovation. Agricultural waste should be utilized as resources to create the sustainable development of the industry.
CCTV:
I have a question concerning the changes in rules for foreign investors. What is the main difference between the new recording system and the administrative approvals on founding and changes of foreign enterprises? Will the new measure impose new restrictions on foreign investors?
Tong Daochi:
In the past, the founding of enterprises had to go through administrative approvals at the Ministry of Commerce, and now investors can file materials for recording online within 30 days before or after they get their business licenses. Instead of examining every requirement set for administrative approval, the recording system will mainly focus on checking information.
In addition, recordings are to provide related information, and will not be preconditions for enterprises to undertake other procedures. Enterprises can even decide whether to get the recording receipt. Therefore, this is a real recording system, which is aimed at easing rules for foreign investors, thus attracting more investment from abroad, and will certainly not impose any new obstacles. However, the new system makes clear that investors should file real information, otherwise they will get punishment. This is a general practice in the international society, which is in accordance with the principle of transparency.
China News Service：
I have a question for Mr Yu from the Ministry of Agriculture. As we know, there are agriculture concerns about national affairs and people’s livelihoods. It is a basic industry, and also a comparatively weak industry. The central government has stressed many times the need to strengthen the support and protection of agriculture. With economic development entering a new phase and fiscal revenue growth continuously decreasing, how will you further strengthen the support and protection of agriculture in the 13th five-year period? Thanks.
Yu Xinrong:
One of the important parts of the 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-2020) is strengthening the support and protection of agriculture. The National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) has done a lot of work in strengthening agricultural investment and increasing agricultural comprehensive production capacity in recent years. And the plan was also co-compiled by the commission and agriculture ministry. Mr Qiu Tianchao from the department of rural economy of NDRC is also here today, so it is better for him to answer this question.
Qiu Tianchao:
It’s my pleasure to answer this question. There is no denying the significance of agriculture, as Chinese people always say that agriculture is the foundation of the national economy and the basic industry concerning people’s livelihoods. In recent years, CPC leaders have repeatedly stressed that no matter how hard the financial situation, continuing efforts should be made to support agricultural development. The efforts can be seen in the plan, as two more indexes have been added to showcase the support for agriculture. One of the indexes is the national public expenditure on agriculture, forestry and water conservation. The other one is about agricultural insurance coverage.
In addition, the plan stipulates special measures to support agricultural development in two aspects. First, major projects. The plan put forward 14 major projects, including high standard farmland construction, rural industrial integration, agricultural technology development, smart agriculture and an increase in farmers’ income. Second, measures in major favorable agricultural policies. They are based on original systems concerning agricultural investment, financial subsidy, financial supports for agriculture, agricultural land use, and prices of agricultural products. Take agricultural investment for example, agriculture and rural areas will be the focus of national investment. As you know, a financial subsidy is the pillar of policies that back up the development of agriculture. So, according to the plan, previous subsidies have been integrated into one subsidy, an exploring effort to establish a pro-ecological subsidy for agriculture.
Qiu Tianchao:
As for financial support for agriculture, a nationwide agricultural credit guarantee system has been put forward to solve the issue of difficult and expensive loan applying among farmers and small- to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Support for agricultural insurance will also be strengthened, which will provide more support to agriculture in general.
In terms of agricultural land, a policy on land for agricultural facilities has been put in place, with a focus on supporting new-type agricultural business entities and building necessary supporting facilities. This policy is emphasized again in the plan.
In terms of agricultural product price and market regulation, the plan stressed the need to continue to implement the minimum purchase price policy for wheat and rice, and adjust and improve the target price policy for cotton and soybean. In particular, for corn, the plan has brought forward to set up mechanisms for market-oriented acquisition and producer subsidies, adapting to new situations and structure adjustment. All of these policies have been made very clear in the plan. The general direction of price and market regulation reforms is to bring into full play the role of market mechanisms and foster diversified purchase entities, thus allowing the market to play a greater role in the formation of agricultural product prices.
Xi Yanchun:
Thank you. From your introduction, we can see there are indeed a lot of new highlights in this plan. Another question, please.
Xinhua News Agency:
My question goes to Mr. Yu. You mentioned that great achievements were made in agricultural production during the 12th Five-Year Plan period. However, there are some views that to some extent, these achievements were based on the excessive consumption of resources and the environment, for example, excessive use of pesticides and chemical fertilizers, over-exploitation of groundwater, and exacerbated pollution of agricultural resources. Are there any new measures in place to reduce the consumption of resources and environment in agricultural production during the 13th Five-Year Plan period? Thank you.
Yu Xinrong:
As I mentioned earlier, the 13th Five-Year Plan is different from those in the past. It emphasizes sustainable development. We should make good use of our ancestors’ valuable resources, as well as better meeting people’s basic needs for food and clothing. We should also conserve a blue sky and pure land for our future generations. In this regard, we have ideas and specific plans in achieving them. Now let’s welcome Zhang Hecheng from the Ministry of Agriculture to answer the question.
Zhang Hecheng:
Hello, everyone. I’m very glad to answer this question. More detailed contents will be released when the guidelines are unveiled. Here, let me make a brief introduction. The guidelines placed sustainable agricultural development at a prominent position, with a section to spell out measures for green development, mainly from two aspects of ecological and environmental protection. In terms of ecological protection, it stressed to protect land, water, forest, grassland and wetland fishery resources. Efforts will be made to adhere to and protect the ecological “red line”, gradually recover overexploited agricultural resources and build a strong ecological barrier of green development. As for environmental protection, it decided to strive for a “zero growth” in the use of pesticides and chemical fertilizers, promote a harmless treatment of agricultural wastes, tackle issues with the overexploitation of groundwater and the heavy metal pollution of farmland. In addition, it will pilot an arable land fallow and rotation system in a bid to curb the excessive use of agricultural resources and non-point source pollution, propelling the green development of agriculture. Thank you
Xi Yanchun:
Now, today’s policy briefing is over. Thank you all.
