China’s food security requires local Communist Party members to step up, new agricultural minister says

Comments serve as latest sign that Beijing is ramping up efforts to increase reliance on domestic harvests to feed the nation’s 1.4 billion people

Agricultural minister doubles down on political rhetoric by singling out bureaucrats at provincial level

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China’s new agricultural minister says the nation will strive to keep its soybean acreage above 9.33 million hectares (23 million acres) to secure greater self-sufficiency in edible soybeans. Photo: Reuters

Published: 6:30pm, 7 Jan 2021Updated: 8:40pm, 7 Jan 2021

Beijing must hold provincial Communist Party secretaries and governors personally responsible for adequate grain output, the country’s new agricultural minister said this week, calling this “the most important and necessary step” in ensuring China’s food security.

The comments serve as the latest sign that Beijing is ramping up its efforts to increase reliance on domestic harvests to feed the nation’s 1.4 billion people.

Tang Renjian, the newly installed minister of agricultural and rural affairs, also mapped out a to-do list to improve the country’s crop production this year, including increasing the corn acreage and increasing self-sufficiency in edible soybeans, to keep the annual grain output over 780 billion kg (1.72 trillion pounds).

A series of policy moves from central authorities in recent weeks suggest that a cycle of large-scale expansion in grain-planting acreage is likely to be seen in China this year, according to analysts.

In the face of the lingering disruption by the Covid-19 pandemic over the global agricultural trade and what it perceives to be an increasingly hostile world, the Chinese leadership has been increasingly emphasising the importance of grain security since the middle of last year. Chinese President Xi Jinping even kicked off a nationwide campaign to cut food waste.