Problems and Recommendations for Confirmation of Land Right in Rural Areas

, *

1. School of Economics, Yangtze University, Jingzhou 434023, China; 2. Hubei Collaborative Innovation Center for Grain Industry, Yangtze University, Jingzhou 434025, China

ProblemsandRecommendationsforConfirmationofLandRightinRuralAreas

XiaodiFAN1,2,PumingHE1,2*

1. School of Economics, Yangtze University, Jingzhou 434023, China; 2. Hubei Collaborative Innovation Center for Grain Industry, Yangtze University, Jingzhou 434025, China

Land, the foundation of agriculture and farmers, is the most basic capital goods of agricultural production. Confirmation of land right in rural areas not only effectively protects the land contract management right of peasants and helps to realize the informatization management of land contract, but also lays a foundation for land circulation and scale management. In addition, it also promotes the realization of agricultural modernization. This paper analyzes the problems in the confirmation of land right and sets forth recommendations under the premise of realizing the importance of confirmation of land right.

Confirmation of land right, Problems, Recommendations

1 Introduction

Confirmation of land right admits the existing rural land contract relationship. It aims to make the existing rural land-contracted relationship clearer, to realize the informatization management of land contract and stabilize the contract relationship. It makes these realized through application, examination, investigation, registration, certification and a series of links on the basis of ensuring the use of rural land in the same direction. Since 2009, six No. 1 documents from the national central government have posed some requirements about confirmation of land right in rural areas. It begins as a pilot project in the village, and then in the county, and finally in the whole province. The work is conducted in 1988 counties (cities, districts), covering an area of 330 million mu. The performance is remarkable, but the problem is also very serious. It is necessary to carefully analyze the problems in the confirmation of land right and find a solution in order to achieve agricultural modernization.

2 The importance of confirmation of land right in rural areas

2.1Protectingfarmers’managementpoweroverlandcontractandincreasingtheirincomeThe land contractual management rights mean that the contractors are entitled to possessing, using, and disposing land within the laws. But for various reasons, the rural land ownership relation is not clear and complete. This also makes the land, which is the foundation of agriculture and farmers, fail to bring the corresponding property income for farmers. Confirmation of land right in rural areas makes the contracted land area more accurate, the boundary clearer and it gives farmers more rights by measuring the rural contracted land precisely and audit contract relationships strictly. The work not only strengthens the existing rural land system, but also makes farmers get the property income form land. Land circulation will enable some of the farmers to be freed from the land. On the one hand, it broadens the channels of the source of the farmers’ income. On the other hand, it protects the legitimate rights and interests of farmers and provides the solution to "Farmers-Agriculture-Rural Areas" issues.

2.2PromotingthelandcirculationtoformappropriatescalemanagementoflandThe basic characteristic of modern agriculture is specialization, standardization, scale and intensification of agricultural production. A certain scale of land concentration is conducive to the development of modern agriculture. After the registration of ownership, farmers’ management power over land contract has been effectively protected. It relieves the farmers’ worries, and lays the foundation for the orderly transfer of rural land. The orderly transfer of land, on the one hand, vitalizes the sleeping land resources and improves the utilization efficiency of the rural land. On the other hand, it allows the concentration of land to farming experts, cooperatives, and rural households and promotes the formation of appropriate scale management of land, and it is also good for the promotion of science and technology, the use of advanced equipment and the improvement of food production. All that we do is to protect our country’s food security. Even more importantly, it is also an important measure to realize the mechanization and modernization of agriculture. It is also an important measure to realize the new industrialization, informatization, urbanization and agricultural modernization.

2.3InnovatingupontherurallandmanagementandmaintainingthesocialstabilityinruralareasIn the second land contract, some problems have arisen, for example, the contracted land area is not accurate, the boundary and the contract relationship are unclear. This makes disputes on ownership of land rights become an important issue of rural social stability. The confirmation of rural land right makes the contracted land area more accurate, the boundary and the contract relationship clearer. It takes the information about the position of land, the farmer, the land transfer into the management system and it leads to standardization, informatization and scientificity of the management of land contract. The work is conducive to implementing the national agricultural policy, and truly protecting the rights and interests of farmers. It is more important to reduce the disputes caused by land ownership and maintain the stability of rural society, which is conducive to the development of rural economy.

3 The problems in confirmation of land right in rural areas

3.1LackofpreparationbeforeregistrationandexistenceofresistanceinimplementationConfirmation of land right in rural areas is a huge and complicated task. To make this work cover millions of households and every piece of land, it is necessary to invest a lot of manpower, material and financial resources. The work is closely related to the interests of farmers and the stability of rural society, so the work can not be done without each farmer’s participation and efficient work. Due to the lack of publicity and training for grassroots cadres in most of the pilot areas, the majority of farmers and workers are not clearly aware of the importance of approval of the work, farmers’ participation and cooperation are not very positive, and the staff also have fear for difficulties and do things with no serious attitude because of the lack of scientific guidance. Such work atmosphere is bound to hinder the development of the work.

3.2LowefficiencyintheprocessThis work requires application, examination, investigation, registration, certification and a series of links, and errors of each step will influence the implementation of the work. The confirmation work now is based on the existing land contract relations, so it needs farmers to provide a second land contract. However, most of the farmers are unable to provide the land contract because of time and bad keeping. These phenomena have brought some difficulties to the work. In the measurement process, the method of GPS is used in some pilot areas. However, the accuracy and efficiency of this method can not meet the requirements, not only affecting the progress of the work, but also producing a hidden dispute for the ownership of the land. The main difficulty is that the contracted land area is not accurate, and the boundary is not clear. In addition, the transfer of land and implementation of some projects make the original land boundary unclear or even disappear, which brings great difficulties to identification of the land. Some areas even have a new round of disputes due to land adjustment, because no one can be found to sign, and the ownership can not be implemented in the process of registration and certification. A wide range of confirmation of land right needs enough money and heavy workload, but the lack of money for most regions still hampers the work.

3.3LanduseconversionafterregistrationFarmers’ right to contract management has been guaranteed after registration, and various forms of land transfer have emerged. Although the policy requires that the use of the land remains unchanged, the phenomenon of land use conversion still exists. A lot of industrial and commercial enterprises rent land for non-agricultural management under the guise of developing rural economy. In some places, the gov-ernment even damages the interests of the farmers through administrative means in order to improve the proportion of circulation. Firstly, contractors who bear the cost of rent and the risk of market will choose to grow economic crops with good economic benefits. Due to the low economic benefits of growing food crops, non-agricultural trend has become a general trend after the land circulation. Secondly, the lack of incentives makes the vast majority of the land flow into the industrial and commercial enterprises. Industrial and commercial enterprises have a large scale with adequate capital in general, so they will give a higher rent price. This makes family farm and other new subjects of agricultural management weak in the process of land circulation. Finally, the rural regulatory mechanism is not perfect and there is no policy to deal with the phenomenon of land use conversion. The phenomenon of land use conversion has brought a big obstacle to the food security of China, so we should do everything we can to stop this behavior.

4 Recommendations

4.1Strengtheningthepropagandaandmobilizationandimprovingpeople’sparticipatingenthusiasmFirst of all, government should intensify propaganda in order to make farmers and the staff really understand the importance and necessity of confirmation by putting up propaganda posters everywhere, distributing propaganda materials to farmers, conducting relevant lectures and so on. It is necessary to eliminate the worries of farmers, and make farmers realize that this is a big event involving their own interests. Only by this way can farmers really understand, support the work and actively participate. For the staff involved in this work, it is necessary to strengthen their consciousness of service and responsibility, improve the quality of the staff, eliminate their fear, and let them put their hearts into work.

4.2Increasingcapital,technologyandmanpowerinvestmentandimprovingworkingefficiencyiIn order to ensure that the work can be carried out smoothly, first of all, the state must increase the fund investment and the financial departments at all levels should also properly handle the expenses according to local financial resources and local conditions. Secondly, we should increase the technical support and guidance to the work, and encourage the use of precise measuring instruments and advanced technology. For the land which is difficult to measure, we should turn to a professional company. In addition, we should strengthen the technical training of staff, and let them learn job skills skillfully. Only in this way can we improve the work efficiency, and reduce new disputes. Finally, there is a need to strengthen supervision and set up the corresponding arbitration institution to resolve the dispute.

4.3StrengtheningthelicensingcontrolandencouragingthedevelopmentofnewsubjectsofagriculturalmanagementSome businesses contract land on a large scale after confirmationand the phenomenon of land use conversion has emerged. The government should do everything to stop this behavior in accordance with relevant laws and regulations of land management. The fundamental reason for this phenomenon lies in the low economic efficiency of growing grain. So first of all, the government should increase the grain purchasing price and the subsidies for food, and lower the price of agricultural production means, to arouse the enthusiasm of the people for grain production. It is necessary to increase incentives and subsidies for cooperatives, family farms and other new subjects of agricultural management and give them more financial and technical support. Finally, we should establish and perfect relevant laws and regulations, so that the government has a legal basis. Governments at all levels should also be strict about the qualification examination of the industrial and commercial enterprises and strengthen the supervision of land circulation and usage. Confirmation of land right in rural areas is to establish a complete electronic management system for the farmers’ contracted land. The ultimate goal is to protect the land contract management rights of farmers, make the land transfer orderly, and promote the development of agriculture and agricultural modernization. In addition, this work makes agriculture no longer restrict the realization of new-style industrialization, informatization, urbanization and agricultural modernization. During the process, the government should formulate appropriate policies in accordance with local conditions and the most important point of the work is to protect the interests of farmers.

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November 20, 2015 Accepted: January 25, 2016

*Corresponding author. E-mail: janny0713@163.com