China's farmers cannot feed hungry cities
No longer self-sufficient in food, the country today increasingly has to buy abroad, raising global prices
Jonathan Watts in Beijing
Thursday August 26, 2004
The Guardian
China's leaders have raised the alarm about their country's ability to feed itself as rapid development sucks land, water and people from the food-producing countryside into increasingly large and hungry cities.
After a steady fall in grain harvests, the world's most populous nation recently became a net importer of food for the first time in its history, raising domestic political concerns and driving up international prices of wheat, rice and soya.
Hu Jintao, the president, has commissioned studies on food security. The prime minister, Wen Jiabao, has visited a farm to urge peasants to boost production with a warning that grain security is a matter of social stability. Ministers have hurriedly cancelled plans to develop farmland and the agricultural ministry is offering tax incentives to farmers who switch to grain production.
Food security is a visceral issue for a generation that grew up during the famines of the 40s and 50s, when an estimated 40 million people died of starvation largely as a result of the headlong charge towards industrialisation known as the Great Leap Forward.
Although China's hefty foreign exchange reserves make it unlikely that there will be another famine any time soon, elderly leaders have watched with concern as the country's agricultural surplus has disappeared just as the appetites of its increasingly affluent population has grown.
During Mao Zedong's era, every local district was supposed to be self-sufficient in grain, which often necessitated diversion of scarce water resources into arid areas. Now, however, the priority for the water and the land is industrial and urban development.
With economic zones opening up across the country and more than 10 million peasants moving into cities every year, the amount of arable land in China has shrunk by 6.7m hectares (16.75m acres) since 1996.
According to Lin Yueqin, an economic researcher at the China Social Science Academy, the growth of cities is largely to blame for last year's record drop in grain supply.
"Urbanisation has eaten into the size of the nation's arable land. Farmers feel there is little profit to be had from their traditional crops so we've seen a long decline in grain output," he said.
Since 1998's record harvest of 512m tonnes, grain production has fallen every year to just over 400m tonnes.
At the same time, appetites are growing. The 9% annual growth of the economy is pushing up wages and pushing out waistlines. Urbanites are more likely to eat meat - which is fattened on grain - and they are more likely to be fat. According to one study of children in Shanghai, 8% of three- to six-year-olds are obese.
To feed this increasingly hungry population, China has had to look overseas. In the first six months of the year, the value of food imports surged 62% to $14.4bn (£8bn). Although the harvest may improve this year, it is thought unlikely to be enough to match rising demand. Soyabean imports, which doubled last year to 20.3m tonnes, are expected to double again this year. The World Bank forecasts a rise in net grain imports from 14m tonnes next year to 32m tonnes in 2020.
Even rice - the traditional staple - is more likely to come from neighbouring countries. Such is the demand that Thai farmers report entire crops being bought long before har vests. Vietnamese authories blame food-smuggling for a record 20% increase in the price of rice. For the first time, Pakistan is being approached as a rice supplier. In one novel experiment, the Chongqing municipal government is leasing land in Laos to grow food for its urban population.
This has lead to a surge in global food prices. Grain futures are up 30% this year thanks largely to the China factor.
Although Beijing's leaders are concerned that the growing dependence on imports - particularly grain from the US, Canada and Australia - is a strategic vulnerability, many economists argue that it makes sense to import because China must feed 20% of the world's population with only 7% of the planet's arable land.
China can also afford more imported food than in the past. Thanks to a booming manufacturing sector, the country has healthy foreign exchange reserves of $470bn. Most farmers would rather produce high-value, labour-intensive export crops like fruit and mushrooms than wheat and barley, which can be produced more cheaply in the US.
No longer self-sufficient in food, the country today increasingly has to buy abroad, raising global prices
Jonathan Watts in Beijing
Thursday August 26, 2004
The Guardian
China's leaders have raised the alarm about their country's ability to feed itself as rapid development sucks land, water and people from the food-producing countryside into increasingly large and hungry cities.
After a steady fall in grain harvests, the world's most populous nation recently became a net importer of food for the first time in its history, raising domestic political concerns and driving up international prices of wheat, rice and soya.
Hu Jintao, the president, has commissioned studies on food security. The prime minister, Wen Jiabao, has visited a farm to urge peasants to boost production with a warning that grain security is a matter of social stability. Ministers have hurriedly cancelled plans to develop farmland and the agricultural ministry is offering tax incentives to farmers who switch to grain production.
Food security is a visceral issue for a generation that grew up during the famines of the 40s and 50s, when an estimated 40 million people died of starvation largely as a result of the headlong charge towards industrialisation known as the Great Leap Forward.
Although China's hefty foreign exchange reserves make it unlikely that there will be another famine any time soon, elderly leaders have watched with concern as the country's agricultural surplus has disappeared just as the appetites of its increasingly affluent population has grown.
During Mao Zedong's era, every local district was supposed to be self-sufficient in grain, which often necessitated diversion of scarce water resources into arid areas. Now, however, the priority for the water and the land is industrial and urban development.
With economic zones opening up across the country and more than 10 million peasants moving into cities every year, the amount of arable land in China has shrunk by 6.7m hectares (16.75m acres) since 1996.
According to Lin Yueqin, an economic researcher at the China Social Science Academy, the growth of cities is largely to blame for last year's record drop in grain supply.
"Urbanisation has eaten into the size of the nation's arable land. Farmers feel there is little profit to be had from their traditional crops so we've seen a long decline in grain output," he said.
Since 1998's record harvest of 512m tonnes, grain production has fallen every year to just over 400m tonnes.
At the same time, appetites are growing. The 9% annual growth of the economy is pushing up wages and pushing out waistlines. Urbanites are more likely to eat meat - which is fattened on grain - and they are more likely to be fat. According to one study of children in Shanghai, 8% of three- to six-year-olds are obese.
To feed this increasingly hungry population, China has had to look overseas. In the first six months of the year, the value of food imports surged 62% to $14.4bn (£8bn). Although the harvest may improve this year, it is thought unlikely to be enough to match rising demand. Soyabean imports, which doubled last year to 20.3m tonnes, are expected to double again this year. The World Bank forecasts a rise in net grain imports from 14m tonnes next year to 32m tonnes in 2020.
Even rice - the traditional staple - is more likely to come from neighbouring countries. Such is the demand that Thai farmers report entire crops being bought long before har vests. Vietnamese authories blame food-smuggling for a record 20% increase in the price of rice. For the first time, Pakistan is being approached as a rice supplier. In one novel experiment, the Chongqing municipal government is leasing land in Laos to grow food for its urban population.
This has lead to a surge in global food prices. Grain futures are up 30% this year thanks largely to the China factor.
Although Beijing's leaders are concerned that the growing dependence on imports - particularly grain from the US, Canada and Australia - is a strategic vulnerability, many economists argue that it makes sense to import because China must feed 20% of the world's population with only 7% of the planet's arable land.
China can also afford more imported food than in the past. Thanks to a booming manufacturing sector, the country has healthy foreign exchange reserves of $470bn. Most farmers would rather produce high-value, labour-intensive export crops like fruit and mushrooms than wheat and barley, which can be produced more cheaply in the US.
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