The annual Central Rural Work Conference that concluded in Beijing on Wednesday mapped out the priorities for China’s rural work next year, pointing out that the country needs to strengthen scientific and technological innovation and reform, increase research efforts in core technologies and improve the work system and mechanism related to agriculture, rural areas and farmers, to add impetus and vitality to the modernization of agriculture.

The continuous transformation and upgrading of agriculture into a modern industry is an important way for China to build a strong agricultural country. To this end, reforms should be carried out to better activate idle rural resources and provide a basis for the development of new agricultural productivity.

Reform of the rural collective property rights system can offer a better solution to the fragmentation of rural resources and other problems. On the basis of experimental reforms carried out in the past years, further reforms that push for the merger of “small fields into large farms” will continue to be advanced. At the same time, based on the reform of the collective property rights system and the rural revitalization strategy, all localities need to further promote the development path of new collective economies led by cooperatives and village companies, to broaden the development space for modern rural industries and explore new mechanisms for common prosperity in rural areas.

The optimization of other factors such as rural logistics, informatization and digitalization, and the entry and creation of some other new factors can promote the synergistic integration of the three key areas of rural industries, rural construction and rural governance, which will facilitate the formation and development of new rural productivity, and promote the modernization and upgrading of rural industries. Given that the modernized transformation and upgrading of agriculture is inseparable from the guidance and support of scientific and technological innovation, to promote agricultural modernization China should first develop modern agriculture, modern equipment manufacturing, and modern services.

The development of modern agriculture will stimulate the effective demand for various kinds of agricultural products and services.