Capital inflow injects vigor to agriculture

Another subsidiary of Joyvio, China New Agriculture Technology Co Ltd, based in Sichuan province, grows kiwi fruit on nearly 700 hectares of model orchards.

Currently, the scattered agricultural production model makes standardization difficult, which contributes to food safety problems, said Chen Shaopeng, senior vice president of Legend Holdings Ltd and managing director of Joyvio Group.

Chen said the company will manage the production process and gradually foster partners in industrialized agriculture chains.

Joyvio plans to invest one to two billion yuan in the next five years in building projects, such as a world-class fruit research center, modernized kiwi fruit planting bases and fruit packaging and storage centers, said Chen in an interview with the Chengdu Business Daily in Sichuan last week.

The capital flowing into the countryside could increase farmers' income, give jobs to the few remaining rural laborers, and make use of abandoned farmland, said Liu Jun, vice president of Southwest University of Political Science and Law.

Development of modern agriculture requires the support and participation of industrial and commercial capital, said Agriculture Minister Han Changfu at the end of last year.

For companies that rent land for large-scale farming, entrance and supervision regulations should be drawn as early as possible to impose limits on non-grain production and ban non-agriculture use, he added.

In Jiangjin district, more than 20 companies tried to invest in real estate under the guise of building rural tourist locations, but were refused by local authorities.

By the end of 2012, 1.87 million hectares of arable land had been rented by companies, but in some areas, only six percent of land rented by firms was used for planting crops, said a Ministry of Agriculture official in early 2013.

The Chinese government is prudent about capital investment in the countryside, and is both encouraging and restricting the practice, said Zhang Xiaode, an agriculture professor at the Chinese Academy of Governance.

The first policy document issued by the Chinese government for 2014 said the country is exploring insurance for agricultural land transfers to industrial and commercial enterprises and that "non-agricultural use of farming land is strictly prohibited".

The document stressed domestic grain production, strict observation of a "red line" minimum for the country's arable land, and raising agricultural production capacity to ensure basic self-sufficiency of grain products and food security.