China to lift grain output 10 percent by 2020, tackle rural pollution

China is aiming to increase its grain production capacity by 10 percent by 2020, even as it seeks to halt excessive use of fertiliser and pesticides and promote a more environmentally friendly farm sector. Ensuring self-sufficiency in major food crops is a top priority for China, the world's most populous country, but the government is also under pressure to tackle severe pollution plaguing its rural areas.
The 13th five-year-plan for the development of the rural economy published by the National Development and Reform Commission on Thursday reiterated a previously set goal to boost grain output capacity to 550 million tonnes in 2020 from 500 million tonnes last year. The state planner also reiterated a target for zero growth in fertilisers and pesticides by 2020 and a plan to promote recycling of plastic films widely used on crops.
China consumes around a third of global fertilisers, with rapid growth in use in recent years driven largely by higher fruit and vegetable production. Excessive use of chemical fertilisers and pesticides has led to polluted water sources, contamination of soil with heavy metals and high pesticide residues on food.
Environmental problems are "increasingly prominent, water and soil resources are in short supply, and soil fertility in some areas is clearly falling", according to the document, outlining the challenges faced by China's rural economy. Beijing recently said it wanted banks to play a bigger role in providing financing required to tackle mounting environmental problems in rural regions.
China also wants to see higher levels of mechanisation and more innovation to increase efficiency in the agriculture sector, the document said, and will encourage more value-added farm products such as organic produce. It is encouraging its agriculture companies to invest overseas too, as well as more cooperation with neighbouring countries and those along Beijing's new Silk Road. The state planner also said China would hold its arable land area steady at 1.87 billion mu, or 124 million hectares, and protect arable land from development.