Chinese President Xi Jinping has toured a village in the southwestern province of Sichuan to emphasise the need to strengthen grain production and increase the size of modern farms.
State broadcaster CCTV showed footage of Xi walking through green fields and inspecting the harvest with grains in his hand during his visit on Wednesday to the village of Yongfeng, part of Meishan city, as he urged local officials to boost production.
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Beijing has repeatedly emphasised the importance of food security and Xi’s visit follows a tradition of carefully choreographed inspection tours by state leaders aimed at sending a political message to highlight policy priorities.
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According to CCTV, Yongfeng’s fields are among the most mechanised in Sichuan. “In Yongfeng village, a key area of Xi Jinping’s inspection was about promoting the building of high standard farmland to boost grain production,” the report said.
CCTV also reminded audiences of Xi’s remarks to representatives from the agriculture and social welfare sectors in March – during the annual “two sessions” parliamentary meetings – that “grain security” was a major concern for China, as he set a target for a national increase to 1 billion mu (67 million hectares) of high-quality farmland.
The report said 1,500 mu (100 hectares) of Yongfeng’s 3,100 mu (207 hectares) high-quality rice paddies are fully mechanised, making it a showcase with the highest proportion of modernised fields in Sichuan.
It added that the average annual net income for the roughly 5,000 villagers is 28,000 yuan (US$4,200), ranking fourth in the province.
While Beijing has rarely explicitly mentioned the impacts of Russia’s Ukraine war and the Covid-19 pandemic on global food shortages, it has repeatedly highlighted the importance of food security.
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Soaring food and energy prices have already driven the annual world inflation rate to 9.2 per cent, the World Economic Forum said in May, and international bodies like the UN’s Food and Agricultural Organisation – led by China’s former vice-minister for agriculture Qu Dongyu – have warned of a looming global food crisis.
China is also eager to reduce its reliance on food imports and ensure self-sufficiency in staples and other key agricultural products.
The message of self-reliance in grain production was also highlighted by Xi on a visit in April to the southern province of Hainan, where he emphasised the importance of making sure China has a sufficient supply of high-quality seeds.
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