National Development and Reform Commission: Three-pronged measures promote China’s rice bowl to be mainly filled with Chinese grain

China News Service, November 6th. The National Development and Reform Commission held a series of press conferences for the "15th Five-Year Plan" on the morning of the 6th to introduce the situation of building a secure foundation. Hu He, deputy director of the Rural Economic Department of the National Development and Reform Commission, said at the meeting that during the "15th Five-Year Plan" period, the National Development and Reform Commission will work with local and relevant departments, guided by a new round of actions to increase grain production capacity of 100 billion kilograms, to consolidate the production base, refine the path to increase production, and strengthen policy support to ensure that China's rice bowl is mainly filled with Chinese grain.

At the meeting, a reporter asked, how is the current progress of the new round of increasing grain production capacity by 100 billion kilograms? During the "15th Five-Year Plan" period, how to improve the comprehensive grain production capacity, better coordinate production, structure and resilience, and systematically stabilize the granary of a large country?

Huhe introduced that the key to ensuring food security is to ensure food production capacity. In March 2024, the State Council issued and implemented the "New Round Action Plan for Increasing Grain Production Capacity (2024-2030)", which has entered its third year this year. In general, all regions and departments have made solid progress in storing grain in the land and in technology, continuously improved support policies and investment guarantee mechanisms, stepped up efforts to promote the construction of supporting projects, and made significant progress. In 2025, my country's grain output will reach 1.43 trillion jins, holding steady at 1.4 trillion jins for two consecutive years, providing solid support for promoting stable and healthy economic and social development and effectively responding to external risks and challenges.

Huhe said that during the "15th Five-Year Plan" period, the National Development and Reform Commission will work with local and relevant departments to conscientiously implement the decisions and arrangements of the Party Central Committee and the State Council. Guided by a new round of actions to increase grain production capacity of 100 billion kilograms, we will consolidate the production foundation, refine the path to increase production, strengthen policy guarantees, roll up our sleeves to build good fields and breed good seeds, so that China's rice bowl will mainly contain Chinese grain. Focus on three aspects of work.

First, grasp the two key points of cultivated land and seeds. One key is to improve the quality of cultivated land. In recent years, the country has made great efforts to promote the construction of high-standard farmland and continue to consolidate the foundation of farmland water conservancy. At present, more than 1 billion acres of high-standard farmland have been built across the country, farmland irrigation and drainage capabilities are improving year by year, and the resilience of grain production continues to increase. In the next step, we will continue to improve and improve the construction, operation, and management mechanisms, promote the construction of high-standard farmland with high quality, and gradually build all qualified permanent basic farmland into high-standard farmland, so as to truly achieve less production loss in severe disasters, stable production in light disasters, and increased production in the absence of disasters. At the same time, we will speed up the construction and renovation of key projects in irrigation areas to turn more "looking fields" into "guaranteed harvest fields." Another key is to do a good job in the seed industry. In-depth implementation of the seed industry revitalization action, focusing on the whole chain of "conservation - breeding - testing - propagation", layout the modern seed industry project during the "15th Five-Year Plan" period, strengthen the protection and utilization of germplasm resources, improve the commercial breeding innovation system, improve variety testing and evaluation capabilities, cultivate new varieties with high yield, high quality, stress resistance and wide adaptability, firmly hold the leading varieties in their own hands, and further consolidate the seed source foundation for increasing grain production capacity.

Second, we must work hard to stabilize area and increase unit output. In 2025, my country's grain sown area will be 1.791 billion acres, maintaining steady growth for six consecutive years, and the increase in unit yield will contribute more than 90% to the increase in grain production. With limited arable land resources, the main direction of improving grain production capacity during the "15th Five-Year Plan" period is to further increase yield levels on the basis of ensuring the stability of sown area. In the next step, we must not only insist on stabilizing area, strictly implement the party and government's shared responsibilities for food security, strictly abide by the red line of cultivated land protection, and ensure the stability of grain sown area, we must also focus on improving yields, combine local farming habits and actual resource endowments, implement policies by region and variety, promote the integration and efficiency of good land, good seeds, good opportunities, and good methods, and achieve a large-scale balanced increase in production of major grain and oil crops.

Third, we should better mobilize the enthusiasm of farmers to grow grain and local governments to grasp grain. To ensure national food security, we must further optimize and improve grain production support policies, insist on increasing production and income at the same time, and effectively increase production enthusiasm with stable income. On the one hand, it allows farmers to make money growing grain. Focus on reducing costs, preventing risks, stabilizing prices, and increasing efficiency in grain production, coordinate production, procurement, storage, and imports, and coordinate the role of policies such as investment and price, subsidies, and insurance to strengthen and benefit farmers and enrich farmers, and stabilize farmers' expectations for income from growing grain. On the other hand, it allows local governments to capture food without suffering losses. We will improve the interest compensation mechanism for major grain-producing areas, implement inter-provincial horizontal interest compensation policies for grain production and marketing areas, support major production areas in improving grain production capacity and comprehensive benefits, insist on the joint efforts of main production areas, main sales areas, and balanced production and marketing areas to shoulder the same responsibility, and fully mobilize local enthusiasm for focusing on agriculture and grain.