China food security: cash rewards for whistle-blowers mark widening crackdown on grain corruption
- Beijing says it is trying to ‘mobilise the public’ in a bid to exterminate the ‘rats’ and ‘moths’ – corrupt officials who put grain reserves at risk
- Local-level authorities have also been naming and shaming those ensnared in a widening effort to ensure China has enough food to feed its people
China is offering cash rewards to whistle-blowers who expose corruption in its grain sector – up to 150,000 yuan (US$21,000) – in a bid to shore up food security.
People who provide valuable clues that expose illegal practices in the buying and selling of grain meant for national reserves will be rewarded in cash, as an anti-graft campaign in the grain industry deepens, according to a central government directive issued last week.
The offer is meant to “mobilise the public” in the poorly regulated grain reserve system, which Beijing regards as the “ballast stone” of food security, according to the directive, jointly issued by the National Food and Strategic Reserves Administration and the Ministry of Finance.
It came as China’s top leadership has been increasingly emphasising the need to remain self-sufficient in feeding its 1.4 billion people in recent years amid growing challenges from climate change and an uncertain global market due to soured ties with the West and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.