Rural Land Trust Legal Research

Land is one of the most important natural resources which determines the survival and development of human being. In China, the household contract responsibility system has been implementing from the beginning of the reform and opening-up policy till now. The household contract responsibility system greatly motivated farmers at that time. However, with the development of China, the system which has some limits in the mechanism of land transferring has been hindering the development of rural China. To improve the rural land transfer mechanism is contribute to investment and expand rural financing channels, promote the efficient allocation of land resources and improve the overall efficiency of land use.Land trust, as a new and effective way for land transferring, has been playing more importantly roles. In China, rural land is owned by rural collectives, farmers only have the right to land contractual management. Hence, in practice, the purpose of the land trust is realized through the mechanism in which farmers give their own right to the trustees, the trustees use and manage farmer's land. Therefore, the land trust in China is quite different from other countries.This thesis is based on China basic national conditions, combined with the basic principles of trust law, from a legal point of view on the study of rural land trust legal system. This thesis is framed in five parts. The first part is an overview of the land trust issue. It introduces the concept of land trust, states the advantages of land trust and review this issue with the reference of the experiences and lessons from other countries, gives a conclusion of the feasibility of the land trust system in China. The second part focuses on parties to land trust. The individuals got involved in the land trust can be divided into: settler, trustees and beneficiaries. This part determines their rights and obligations in the land trust system. It also defines the supervisors and administrator from charitable trusts. The third part focuses on the rural land trust property. It analyzes the feasibility of the rural land as the trust property, tries to prove the independence of trust property, discusses the ownership of the right to land contractual management and inheritance issues.The fourth part focuses on rural land trust behaviors. It determines rural land trust which established to the legal way, rural land trust behavior changes, termination and the registration of rural land trust.The fifth part gives suggestions on how to improve China rural land trust law system. The suggestions are about"Land Management law","Rural Land Contracting Law","Trust Law". This part also gives some advises on the tax of land trust and the regulations on rural land trust.