Study On The Multi-dimensional Costs Of Food Production In China

Food security is the basis for economic development and social stability of any country. China as the largest developing country in the world, the amount of food demand in China has been increasing as the expanse of population scale and the improvement of per capita income level in the country. To pursue more food output and higher food yield becomes the most important target of agricultural production sector and management department in the context of the policy that is achieving food self-sufficiency basically rely on domestic resources. This study found that the food production costs (the cost of producer, fiscal cost and ecological cost in the process of food production) have been increasing in the last few years. Although food security level in China today is relatively high, the sustainability of food production is rigidly restrained by fiscal resource, social resource and ecological resource. The short of ecological resource and land resource are the basic constraints among these constraints.The achievement of steady food output in present China mostly comes at the costs of more resources investment and more financial subsidy. And if we keep the tendency of high financial subsidy ratio in food production, our financial fund can not sustainable in the long run. Once the financial subsidy encounters any problem then the whole food production system which built on financial subsidy will also encounter high risk. Secondly, today we overemphasize food self-sufficiency and have been making the best use of resources and environment. Due to the overuse of chemical fertilizer and pesticide, agricultural non-point pollution and ecological damage problems is getting worse and worse. Besides, the rapid increases of the ecological cost during food production process directly result to the pollution and damage. All in all, both the run out of material resources and the increase of ecological cost in food production directly impact the ecological sustainable development of agricultural industry. Finally, in the background of mercantile macro policy the development of rural areas has been marginalized, and the gap of economic development between rural China and urban China has been widening. This makes that more and more farmer labors move from rural villages to urban cities. With the outflow of farmer labor, the sustainability of rural society and agricultural industry in China are also being challenged. If we maintain the urban-rural dual economic structure to restrict the outflow of farmers, it will increase the interest differentiation of farmers and other groups. It lacks of social sustainability.In order to break down the three restrictions of food security in China, resources import can be the key to solve the restrictions. This study found that the production cost of grain, wheat, corn and soybean in China is higher than which produced in America, Brazil and African countries by comparing Chinese food production cost with these countries from2006to2010. Not only the production cost in Brazil and Africa are lower than in China, both also both South America and Africa countries have huge arable land resources and amount of ecological resources. It proves that both areas have huge food production potential. Therefore, China not only wants to but also need to enhance agriculture cooperation with these areas. It can not only make better use of China’s fund and technology but also can play the advantage of land resource and ecological resources in Brazil and Africa fully through mutual or multilateral cooperation. It can decrease domestic pressures of resources and economic cost in food production sector, and to realize the sustainable development of China’s food security by importing more foodstuffs from South America and Africa countries.Based on the comparative analysis of the existing food security situation in China, we found that several flaws indwell the current situation. Hence, this study put forward new concept as well as new guarantee mode of China’s food security to take the place of the existing mode. Since the existing guarantee mode overwhelms emphasis on food self-sufficiency, it brings economic (public finance), social and ecological challenges to food production. The sustainability of economic, social and ecological faces difficulties and challenges in the field of agricultural production. Therefore, the new concept of food security will put more emphasis on harmonious relationship between food quantitative security and sustainable development. The new food security concept suggests our government should decrease the rate of food self-sufficiency, make better use of domestic and international markets and resources. It can reduce financial cost and ecological cost for guaranteeing food security in China.This dissertation consists of four parts and a total of eight chapters.The first chapter of "Forward" as the first part of the thesis, it primarily provides the research background and significance, the definition of the key concepts, review of research status (literature review), the structure and main content of research, the research ideas, approach and data sources. At the end of this part the author point out the innovation points and disadvantages of this study.The second part of this dissertation as the main body of this study consists of Chapter Two, Chapter Three, Chapter Four and Chapter Five. This part successively calculates food producer’s cost, fiscal cost and ecological cost of China food production (include grain, wheat, corn and soybean) between2006and2010. Based on this calculation we get the information of total cost of food production in China. In addition, we compare China’s food production cost with American, Brazilian and African correspondingly in Chapter Five.Chapter Six and Chapter Seven constitute the third part of this dissertation. This part first analyzes the current situation and the problems faced by China’s food security. Secondly, the new concept of food security was put forward based on that analysis. Thirdly, in order to better implement the new concept in practice field, we provide the new mode for guaranteeing food security which combined with the current reality of China accordingly. In addition, we take an analysis at the necessity and feasibility of the new guaranteeing mode at the end of this partThe last part of this dissertation has only Chapter Eight. This part summarized the key content of the thesis and also proposed some policy suggestions for the reform of the food security guarantee system in China.