WTO and the problems of rural farmers in China

Introduction: the first principle of WTO is to eliminate trade barriers, the second is to reduce tariffs, and the third is market access According to the general principles of WTO, most of the international agreements on agricultural products were implemented from 1995 to 2000 It mainly includes three contents: increasing import market access; reducing domestic producer support; reducing export subsidies The discussion on whether China's agriculture can adapt to the WTO principles should be extended to the "three rural issues", that is, farmers, rural areas and agriculture, rather than only from the perspective of agriculture 1、 China's concessions in agricultural trade negotiations on agricultural products have always been the most difficult part in GATT negotiations and WTO negotiations The Sino US agricultural cooperation agreement signed in April 1999 in the United States is an integral part of the bilateral agreement that China and the United States should reach to join the WTO After signing the agreement, U.S Agriculture Secretary David Glickman praised the agreement as "an important breakthrough in American agriculture." Because China agreed that wheat from seven states, the main wheat producing area in the northwest of the United States, could be exported directly from Seattle, thus reducing transportation costs and improving price competitiveness In the past, the so-called "controversial barriers" were mainly China's ban on direct imports from the west coast to prevent wheat head smut (TCK) in these areas In addition, China's concessions in agricultural trade are mainly reflected in the package agreement of bilateral negotiations between China and the United States Since China has not officially released any information on China's bid in the bilateral negotiations so far, after the Beijing negotiations, the American press, while introducing the optimistic reflection of farmers, disclosed that the American representative did not step back from the benefits already obtained in the April agreement in terms of agricultural terms Therefore, we can now think that the agricultural clause in the data released unilaterally by the United States on April 8 is the result of the final negotiations between the two sides This is to summarize as follows: 5fh China agrees to substantially increase the import volume of agricultural products under the minimum tariff limit (trq1-3%), and reduce the proportion of monopoly imports of state-owned foreign trade at the request of the United States By 2006, the import of soybeans had increased from 1.7 million tons to 3.3 million tons, an increase of 94%, of which the private sector should have reached 90%; the import of wheat had increased from 2 million tons to 9.3 million tons, 4.65 times of the current level, and the private sector should initially have 10%; the quota of corn had increased from 4.5 million tons to 7.2 million tons, if it had reached that level, it would have been At present, the import volume is 28.8 times of 250000 tons, and the private sector should reach 40%; the rice quota has increased from 2.6 million tons to 5.3 million tons, and if it reaches 21.2 times of the current import volume of 250000 tons, the private sector should reach 50% By 2004, cotton will increase from 200000 tons to 894000 tons, 4.47 times of the current level, and the private sector should reach 67% In addition, China has promised to eliminate export subsidies, especially for agricultural products such as corn, cotton and rice, which are not good for the United States Moreover, by 2004, in addition to reducing the import tariff of agricultural products to less than 17% on the whole, China should further reduce the average tariff of 14.5% on agricultural products imported from the United States with competitive advantages Among them, only 3% are soybeans, 10-12% are meat and fruit, 12-19% are dairy products and 20% are red wine 2、 This paper argues that the positive effect of China's concession on domestic agricultural production and farmers' income should be seen first: 5fh First, under peaceful conditions without interference from other non economic factors, increasing the import of basic agricultural products that occupy a large amount of resources is conducive to the adjustment of agricultural structure in the coastal developed areas where China is short of land resources, especially in the middle of the 21st century when domestic food cannot meet the needs of population growth The second is to increase the export of competitive agricultural products after China's accession to WTO In the 1980s, China's export of agricultural products was mainly land-based basic agricultural products; since the 1990s, it has significantly changed to mainly aquatic products, vegetables and fruits, and some livestock products, and in most years, it can maintain a small surplus of 3-4 billion US dollars Therefore, in the long run, in addition to basic agricultural products such as grain, cotton and oil, China's non resource agricultural products still have export competitiveness The third is to open up foreign investment, which may help rural areas and agriculture where capital is excessively scarce to get investment, because we can assume that in the environment of increasing total capital, foreign capital will enter the profit-making field, while Chinese government investment may turn to sustainable development fields such as rural education, agricultural science and technology promotion, resource development and environmental protection At the same time, we should fully recognize the negative impact of the five Fh: first of all, the grain trade between China and the United States is a typical unequal competition Because the trade competitiveness of the resource-based products of grain basically comes from land rent The larger the land area is, the more absolute the land rent is The small-scale agriculture with an average household land area of only 0.4 hectares in China's rural areas can get little surplus in food production; obviously, it can't compete with the large-scale farms with an average of hundreds of hectares in the United States, because their agricultural surplus can be hundreds of times higher than ours in theory Under the condition that the price of domestic grain is under the pressure of import, the income of farmers in the traditional agricultural areas of the central and western regions will also be affected This is because farmers' income is the distribution of agricultural surplus, which is also the distribution of land rent Most farmers in traditional agricultural areas still receive more than 60% of their income from planting If the comparative income of the planting industry is further reduced due to the impact of import, the farmers can only continue to lose money The second is a long-term policy that is not conducive to the stability of domestic food production China's food and population growth are highly correlated, and the elasticity of substitution of food consumption is low In the last three years, the surplus of food supply is due to the fact that the output target of 2000 was achieved ahead of schedule in 1996, stimulated by the policy of raising price twice in 1994-96 (compared with 1993) But the population has not increased ahead of time If we calculate that the annual growth of 18 million people is normal, 90 million people will be less to consume food, which will certainly cause food surplus In this case, the government's remedy is to stabilize production by means of planning If the quality of imported grain is good and the price is low, and the state can not directly subsidize the farmers' grain production through the planned price, the grain production related to the national strategic security will be difficult to stabilize In order to realize the sustainable development of agriculture since 1998, the policy of agricultural structure adjustment has been restricted seriously Because it includes the variety and quality adjustment of grain In order to make farmers change the past production behavior of pursuing low quality and high output under the market price constraint of high quality and good price, the government decided to withdraw low quality grain from the state order in the summer of 1999 Considering the concession of China's accession to WTO, it is more difficult to adjust the planting structure of traditional agricultural areas For example, Northeast China is the main food crop area in China, and the climate and soil conditions are only suitable for planting spring wheat, corn and soybean However, the gluten of spring wheat is low, the water content of corn is high, the protein of soybean is low, and the price is twice higher than that of international market No matter how to adjust, there is no way out 3、 The impact on rural employment at the turn of the century in China, the biggest problem is the over expansion of low-quality population and the serious surplus of simple labor force According to the recent simulation calculation of Goldman Sachs Asia Research Department, the increase of international trade, capital and technology investment after China's accession to the WTO has a potential contribution of 0.5-0.6% to China's GDP every year, which can correspondingly increase employment We believe that we should be realistic in this regard According to a study by the National Information Center, China's employment elasticity is only 0.108 during the "Eighth Five Year Plan" period, and each percentage point of economic growth can only absorb 600000 jobs Hu Angang's recent research indicates that the employment elasticity has been less than 0.1 during the Ninth Five Year Plan period With the continuous pursuit of capital and technology densification under the pressure of international competition, the effect of economic growth on employment will be less in the next century The more profound problem of FH is that the employment that WTO can promote is mainly concentrated in the financial and trade-oriented service industry It is obviously impossible to promote the non-agricultural employment of more than 200 million low-quality agricultural labor force in China at the end of this century In a new survey released by the development research center of the State Council, about 70% of the farmers who go out to work are pushed out by the shortage of agricultural resources, and about 60% of the farmers who go to cities say they can't find a job or go back If China's concessions in the international trade of agricultural products in accordance with the WTO principles aggravate the contradiction between farmers' income and expenditure, then more pushed out rural labor force without employment will cause serious social contradictions and destroy the situation of stability and unity 5 FH therefore, 0.5 percentage point is important for China's economic growth, but it is more important to change the growth mode For a country with a population of more than 200 million surplus labor force at the end of this century, the urgent task is how to change the mechanism of increasing capital density in the old economic growth mode and form an economic growth mechanism to promote employment Otherwise, it may not be able to extricate itself from Nelson's "growth trap"; it may also be too dependent on a large number of trade to promote economic growth and have to suffer It depends on people 5fH