Central No. 1 Document In-Depth: Focusing on Agricultural and Rural Modernization, First to Propose Normalized Precise Assistance

Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party, the 14th Central No. 1 Document guiding “agriculture, rural areas, and farmers” work was released by Xinhua News Agency on February 3rd, outlining plans to focus on agricultural and rural modernization and solidly promote comprehensive rural revitalization.

The “Opinions of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council on Anchoring Agricultural and Rural Modernization and Solidly Promoting Rural Revitalization” (hereinafter referred to as the Central No. 1 Document) consists of six parts: enhancing comprehensive agricultural production capacity and quality efficiency, implementing normalized targeted assistance, actively promoting stable income growth for farmers, advancing livable, workable, and beautiful rural construction suited to local conditions, strengthening institutional and mechanism innovation, and strengthening the Party’s overall leadership over “agriculture, rural areas, and farmers” work.

Researcher Tu Shengwei from the Macro Economic Research Institute of the National Development and Reform Commission stated that a prominent feature of this year’s Central No. 1 Document is its focus on the goal of agricultural and rural modernization, with planning based on reverse scheduling of annual work. The more modernization advances, the more it is necessary to accelerate consolidating the foundation of agriculture and to address the shortcomings of agricultural and rural modernization. Therefore, this year’s document sets a general deployment for “agriculture, rural areas, and farmers” work around building agriculture into a modern large industry, ensuring rural areas have basic modern living conditions, and enabling farmers to live prosperous and beautiful lives.

Researcher Zhang Zhaoxin from the Agricultural Research Center of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs told The Paper that the 2026 Central No. 1 Document not only deploys “agriculture, rural areas, and farmers” work for 2026 but also considers the policy requirements of the “14th Five-Year Plan.” “‘Building agriculture into a modern large industry’ as a task is integrated into the overall requirements of ‘agriculture, rural areas, and farmers’ work, deepening and expanding policies and concepts such as the integration of primary, secondary, and tertiary industries, large-scale agriculture, and a broad view of food. It also proposes the future development form of agriculture from the perspective of multifunctionality and diverse rural values, and the construction of a modern industrial system. This form covers agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry, fishery, microbial industries, as well as the entire industrial chain of agricultural products including production, processing, and sales, and various new business models and new formats of rural industry integration, which will be the focus of rural industrial system construction during the ‘14th Five-Year Plan’ period.”

Emphasizing the Improvement of Agricultural Quality and Efficiency

This year’s Central No. 1 Document emphasizes enhancing comprehensive agricultural production capacity and quality efficiency, explicitly implementing a new round of the 100-billion-jin grain capacity increase campaign, and promoting dual efforts in crop variety improvement and quality enhancement.

“Centered on the core goal of agricultural and rural modernization, this year’s Central No. 1 Document systematically deploys grain production and agricultural development, emphasizing the continuous improvement of comprehensive agricultural capacity and quality on the basis of safeguarding food security. The document advances the new round of 100-billion-jin grain capacity increase campaign, promotes large-scale yield increases for grain and oil crops, and aims to solidify a realistic and sustainable capacity foundation. It emphasizes coordinated efforts in good land, good seeds, good timing, and good methods to shift grain production from merely stabilizing scale to strengthening capacity,” said Hu Bingchuan, director and researcher at the Rural Development Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

By 2025, China’s grain output will have remained stable above 1.4 trillion jin for two consecutive years. The results of expanding soybean and oilseed planting are being consolidated, with soybean production reaching 20.91 million tons, remaining above 20 million tons for four consecutive years. Zhang Zhaoxin noted that for grain and oil production, the document continues to emphasize capacity consolidation while strengthening quality and efficiency improvements. It explicitly promotes the selection and improvement of grain varieties, quality enhancement projects for grain circulation, and the promotion of products that are marketable and fetch good prices. For “vegetable basket” products, it clearly calls for improving the quality and efficiency of the “vegetable basket” industry. “The main reason is that China’s capacity to guarantee agricultural products has significantly improved, and grain supply is effectively secured. However, the low profitability of grain farming has not changed. Therefore, improving agricultural quality and efficiency has become a policy priority.”

Regarding the protection and quality improvement of arable land, the document proposes establishing a sound management mechanism for the preferential entry and exit of permanent basic farmland. Zhang Zongyi, vice president of the China Agricultural Equipment Industry Development Research Institute at Jiangsu University, told The Paper that this is a major leap in land protection concepts. “In the past, policies focused on ‘red lines and area preservation,’ which was a relatively static form of protection. The core of the ‘preferential entry and exit’ mechanism is dynamic optimization. Permanent basic farmland should be the highest quality, most essential, and best productive land. However, historically, to make room for construction land, many regions mistakenly designated land on mountains, river surfaces, and scattered forests as permanent basic farmland, then strictly enforced the boundaries, causing significant difficulties and hindering the comparative advantage of planting fruits, vegetables, and tea in hilly areas. The proposal to ‘improve the management mechanism for the entry and exit of permanent basic farmland’ corrects previous policies and provides new momentum for the optimization and reconstruction of the agricultural industrial system.”

Zongyi also said that since the 2024 Central No. 1 Document first proposed the integration and promotion of good land, good seeds, good timing, and good methods, the 2026 document continues to emphasize “promoting integrated efficiency of good land, good seeds, good timing, and good methods,” moving from element combination promotion to emphasizing deep coupling among elements to achieve the goal of “efficiency increase” and overall factor productivity improvement.

“The advancement of agricultural modernization is not just about individual factors advancing independently but requires the coordinated promotion of multiple factors to achieve high-quality modernization. However, for a long time, the technical promotion system for agriculture has been fragmented and lacked coordination, leading to issues like unsuitable land for machinery, incompatible techniques, and mismatched varieties. The 2026 No. 1 Document emphasizes the coordinated coupling of ‘good land, good seeds, good timing, and good methods,’ which is a specific requirement for developing new productive forces in agriculture and a concrete pathway for advancing agricultural modernization,” Zhang Zongyi explained.

Enhancing Agricultural Scientific and Technological Innovation

On improving the effectiveness of agricultural scientific and technological innovation, the document proposes accelerating the R&D and application of high-end intelligent agricultural machinery suitable for hilly areas, and strengthening the development and promotion of forestry and grassland machinery.

Zhang Zongyi said that after the 2023 No. 1 Document proposed “accelerating the R&D and application of large intelligent agricultural machinery and small machinery suitable for hilly areas and horticulture,” the 2026 document again emphasizes “accelerating the R&D and application of high-end intelligent and suitable machinery for hilly areas,” with the addition of the word “application” and the removal of “small.”

He pointed out that during the 14th Five-Year Plan period, China launched a campaign to address shortcomings in agricultural machinery, successfully deploying several models suitable for slopes below 15 degrees, such as hill tractors, mountain corn planters, and rapeseed transplanters, transforming some key areas in hilly regions from “no machinery available” to “good machinery in use.”

“The core issue of mechanization in hilly areas is unsuitable land for machinery, not necessarily the need to develop small farm machinery. Developing small machinery just to adapt to hilly terrain is neither economical nor conducive to agricultural modernization. The path involves building mechanized roads, small plots with large fields, short-term to long-term transformations, and slope-to-flat conversions. Based on mechanization-friendly transformations, vigorously developing full-process production machinery suitable for special crops and special farming in hilly areas is the direction for R&D and application of agricultural machinery in these regions.”

The Central No. 1 Document proposes developing new productive forces in agriculture suited to local conditions, promoting the integration of artificial intelligence with agriculture, expanding application scenarios such as drones, IoT, and robots, and accelerating key technological innovations in agricultural biotechnology.

“From a technological perspective, the document emphasizes developing new productive forces in agriculture suited to local conditions, with artificial intelligence, high-end intelligent agricultural machinery, robots, biological breeding, and agricultural biomanufacturing as key supports. This reflects a policy orientation that promotes high-quality agricultural development through technological progress and industrial system upgrades, and also indicates that agricultural science and technology applications are expanding toward more forward-looking and systematic directions,” Hu Bingchuan said.

Implementing Normalized Targeted Assistance

After winning the battle against poverty, the Party Central Committee established a five-year transition period to support poverty-stricken areas and populations. By the end of 2025, all tasks and goals of this transition period will be successfully completed. This year marks the first year of normalized assistance after the end of the five-year transition. The Central No. 1 Document first introduced the concept of “normalized targeted assistance.”

Regarding this, Lin Wanlong, vice president of China Agricultural University, said the biggest difference is the word “normalization.” Before 2020, it was called the “battle phase”; from 2021 to 2025, it was called the “transition period”; starting from 2026, it is explicitly called “normalized assistance,” with the core being “large stability and small adjustments.” “Overall, the previous measures were effective, and these measures need to be stabilized. Of course, some specific policies and measures require further optimization, so they are called small adjustments.”

Zhao Changbao, director of the Rural Economy Research Center at the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, said that implementing classified and precise assistance involves improving the safety net for those without labor capacity; for those with labor capacity, the focus is on coordinated development of developmental assistance. Developmental assistance should be prioritized, with improved incentive mechanisms such as rewards instead of subsidies and performance-based subsidies, encouraging diligent efforts to get rich. It also involves optimizing industrial assistance methods, accelerating the cultivation and expansion of county-led industries with prominent advantages, complete supply chains, and diverse formats, to promote full-chain development of assistance industries and increase farmers’ income. Channels such as east-west labor cooperation, employment assistance workshops, rural public welfare posts, and rural artisan training should be fully utilized to promote stable employment and income growth, and improve the quality and effectiveness of employment assistance.

Highlighting Farmers’ Income Growth

This year’s Central No. 1 Document places great emphasis on increasing farmers’ income, actively promoting stable income growth for farmers. By 2025, the per capita disposable income of rural residents will reach 24,456 yuan, a 6% real increase over the previous year. While farmers’ income has steadily increased over the years, the challenge of maintaining stable growth is increasing and becoming more difficult. Support measures should follow the idea of “stabilizing income, extending the chain, increasing employment, and expanding consumption.”

Zhao Changbao said that policies supporting prices, subsidies, and insurance should be strengthened and coordinated, and a sound income security mechanism for grain farmers should be established. The inter-provincial horizontal benefit compensation policy for grain production and sales areas should be implemented, supporting major grain-producing regions to supplement financial resources and develop grain industries.

Tu Shengwei noted that county economies still have limited population and economic carrying capacity. Therefore, it is necessary to develop some county-level industries with large employment capacity and obvious income-increasing effects to promote local employment and income growth for migrant workers. “Additionally, stable employment should be maintained; those working outside should receive good employment services and support. Returning entrepreneurs should receive increased support. Other methods, such as work-for-relief models, can also help employment groups find jobs and increase income.”

“In terms of farmers’ income and institutional arrangements, the document focuses on improving policy systems and development paths to enhance the stability and sustainability of farmers’ income growth. On one hand, it coordinates the use of prices, subsidies, insurance, and financial tools around grain yield, establishing a sound income security mechanism for grain farmers to stabilize income expectations in main producing areas. On the other hand, cultivating county-level rural industries and promoting the integration of primary, secondary, and tertiary industries in rural areas are key strategies to guide farmers to share development dividends through employment, management, and participation in industrial chains,” Hu Bingchuan said.

(Article source: The Paper)