BEIJING, Jan. 17 (Xinhua) — China seeks to speed up agricultural modernization over the next five years by establishing demonstration zones that leverage deepened reforms and technological innovation to enhance production capacity, as well as the quality and efficiency of agricultural output.
According to an action plan issued recently by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, the Ministry of Finance and the National Development and Reform Commission, the country aims to establish and qualify up to 500 such zones by 2030.
It said the building of these zones will fall under six main categories, namely grain industry, animal husbandry, specialty industries with strength, smart agriculture, urban agriculture, and dryland agriculture.
The establishment of these zones is an important means of accelerating agricultural modernization and coordinating efforts to promote tech-driven and green agriculture, as well as quality improvement and brand building in agriculture, according to the plan.
This plan aims for these zones to take a leading role in efforts to safeguard national food security, ensure the effective supply of important agricultural products, develop new quality productive forces in agriculture, and improve the industrial and operational systems of modern agriculture.
Through these zones, the action plan expects the formation of replicable and scalable development models to push forward agricultural modernization in the country.
The announcement of this action plan followed last month’s annual central rural work conference in Beijing, which called for solidly advancing rural revitalization across the board and promoting integrated urban-rural development, with a strong focus on agricultural and rural modernization. ■
