How to promote rural land reform under the new situation?

How to promote rural land reform under the new situation?

The "three blocks of land" reform must be promoted in a trinity

China's land system is a whole. From the constitutional provisions on urban and rural land ownership, to the land management law prohibiting the use of land other than state-owned land for real estate development, and then the State Council prohibits the legal transaction of small property houses, forming a logic from top to bottom. A consistent system of laws and regulations, land system reform can be said to take the lead.

First of all, regarding the reform of the land acquisition system, the "Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Comprehensively Deepening the Reform of Some Major Issues" (hereinafter referred to as the "Decision") and the "Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council" on the rural land acquisition, collective management construction land entry, housing base system reform pilot The Opinions on Work (hereinafter referred to as the “Opinions”) emphasizes that “the scope of land acquisition should be narrowed down, the land acquisition catalogue should be explored, and the scope of land use for public interest should be strictly defined.”

Since March 2015, the land system reform pilot (hereinafter referred to as the “land reform pilot”) implemented in 33 counties and cities has not discussed the principle of land acquisition for public interest and the scope of land acquisition, mainly on the compensation standard for land acquisition. The author believes that in the current land management law, any unit or individual must apply for the use of state-owned construction land, and any industrial and commercial development and urban construction involving the occupation of rural collective land must be levied by the government as state-owned land before it can be transformed. For the construction of land for urban use, this seems to be contrary to the principle of land acquisition in the public interest. If the land acquisition behavior is strictly limited to the scope of public interest land in accordance with the spirit of the "Decision" and "Opinions", then a large number of non-public interest land needs to be allocated through the urban and rural unified construction land market, and relative to this land acquisition system. The fundamental problem of reform, the compensation for a small amount of public welfare land acquisition has become a secondary issue. The reform of the land acquisition system and the narrowing of the scope of land acquisition are closely related to the entry of rural collective construction land into the market.

Secondly, regarding the construction of a unified urban and rural construction land market, both the "Decision" and the "Opinions" emphasize that, under the premise of meeting the control of planning and use, the rural collective construction land is allowed to be equal to the state-owned construction land, and the same price is the same. In view of the incompleteness of rural collective construction land use rights, the inability to enter the market equally, the same rights and the same price, and the need to improve the trading rules, it is necessary to improve the rural collective management land use property rights system, and grant rural collective construction land use, lease, and Equity can. The current "land reform pilot" has made a relatively narrow and static understanding of rural collectively-operated construction land, and only allows rural households to use land use rights for transfer, lease, and shareholding, and is prohibited from being used for real estate development. 70% of rural collective construction land is a homestead. If the transfer of the right to use rural collective housing sites is transferred between rural collective members, and only 10% of the commercial construction land is allowed to enter the market, it is impossible to form a unified urban and rural area. Competitive construction land market.

Third, regarding the reform and improvement of the rural housing estate system, the "Decision" emphasizes that it is necessary to give farmers more property rights, protect the rights of peasant collective economic organizations, actively develop peasant shareholding cooperation, and give farmers peasant shareholding, income, and compensation for collective assets. Withdrawal and mortgage, guarantee, and inheritance rights. Safeguard the usufructuary right of the farmer's house site, reform and improve the rural house site system, select a number of pilots, prudently and steadily promote the mortgage, guarantee, and transfer of farmers' housing property rights, and explore ways for farmers to increase property income. Establish a rural property rights transfer trading market, and promote the open, fair and standardized operation of rural property rights trading. The current “land reform pilot” only allows farmers who settle in cities to voluntarily and withdrawn or transfer their homesteads within the collective economic organization. For the majority of collective economic organizations that already have homesteads and only allow one household and one house, The circulation of the base has become an empty talk, and the mortgage, guarantee, and transfer of the right to use the homestead are even more difficult to talk about. Therefore, the reform of the land acquisition system, the construction land system and the rural housing system must be promoted in a trinity, and only in this way can we achieve the desired goals.

Rural land system reform must be interactive between urban and rural areas

As far as the reform of land acquisition system is concerned, only the scope of land acquisition for public welfare is strictly limited. As a source of non-public interest land, agricultural land can enter the market, and the two will inevitably form a process of mutual growth and decline; The reform involving land acquisition system also involves the adjustment of urban land ownership structure: the single public ownership of urban land as stipulated in Article 10 of the Constitution must be transformed into the coexistence of state-owned and collective ownership. Therefore, if we want to promote the reform of the land acquisition system, we must adjust the structure of the urban land ownership system by linking the urban and rural construction land market. In this year's two sessions of the country, Chen Xiwen, deputy head of the Central Rural Work Leading Group and director of the office, also pointed out in an interview that the construction of collectively-owned land requires the Constitution to make corresponding changes to the state-owned system of urban land.

With the expiration of the use of state-owned homesteads in many urban dwellings, the issue of whether they are paid or not automatically renewed has gradually been put on the agenda, and the structure and attributes of urban land property rights are also facing the necessary adjustment or redefinition. From this point of view, rural land system reform must be interactive with the urban land system reform.

Linked to industrialization, urbanization, agricultural modernization, and poverty alleviation

At present, China's industrialization has not yet been completed. The development of the secondary and tertiary industries also depends on the provision of sufficient labor for the agricultural transfer population. Although agricultural output accounts for less than 10% of GDP, the rural population still has 43.9% of the resident population and 60.1% of the household registration. Population, 270 million migrant workers have not settled in the city but have not settled down. This kind of "semi-urbanization" makes the rural households' land far from the scale of scale operation, thus restricting the process of agricultural modernization; on the other hand, The 35 million migrant children, 60 million left-behind children, 50 million left-behind women and 50 million left-behind elderly people and 55 million poor people have become serious social problems. All of this is closely related to the relative lag of China's land system reform.

Only deepen the reform of the land system, so that the rural collective land (including agricultural land and construction land, especially the homestead) can meet the same requirements of urban and rural unified planning, and the city's state-owned construction land with the same price and the same price, in order to make the value of rural collective land It has been realized, allowing farmers to truly share the value added of land brought about by industrialized urbanization. Furthermore, on the one hand, the peasants who work in cities get a certain amount of housing expenses; on the other hand, they break the monopoly of local governments on the supply of urban construction land, and reduce the price of land by reducing land prices, thereby reducing the threshold for migrant workers to settle in cities. Moreover, with the gradual reduction of the rural population, the transfer of agricultural land can ensure the realization of the scale operation of farmland, thereby greatly increasing the income of the farmer households, ultimately reducing the rural poor and accelerating the process of agricultural modernization.

Deepening the reform of the land system will not break through the "three bottom lines"

On December 2, 2014, the 7th meeting of the Central Comprehensive Deepening Reform Leading Group pointed out that the reform of the land system should adhere to the three bottom lines of not changing the nature of public ownership of the land, not breaking the red line of cultivated land, and not damaging the interests of farmers. This is in fact consistent with the "three nos" principle emphasized in the speech of General Secretary Xi Xiaogang's symposium. Allowing rural collective land to enter the market directly under the premise of planning and use control, even if it is cultivated land, does not change the public ownership nature of the land; allowing the above-mentioned dynamically adjusted rural collective construction land and the state-owned construction land to enter the market equally, will not Breaking through the red line of cultivated land; allowing the right to use rural housing sites to be mortgaged, leased, and transferred outside the collective economic organization will not cause damage to the interests of farmers. The key issue is that the circulation of rural housing sites, including mortgages, leases and transfers, is to protect or harm the interests of farmers. It is up to the peasants to say the same, as General Secretary Xi said at the Xiaogang Village Symposium: "The right to choose Handed over to farmers, farmers choose, not replace farmers."

In summary, the current land system reform does not have the problem of breaking through the "three bottom lines", but there is still a certain gap between the requirements of "Decision" and "Opinions". We should respond to the call of General Secretary Xi Jinping, "Plus Greatly promote the reform of rural areas under the new situation."

(Original title: How to deal with the relationship between farmers and land in the new situation)