China: Challenges and Opportunities

I have been home for almost two weeks now, things are getting back in order and I have had some time to reflect on my trip.  China was such an interesting place to visit within the context of Nuffield but it is hard to truly wrap my head around what will happen there in the next 10 years.  Their middle class is growing, this class includes farmers including the people I met.  With this growth there are greater demands put on the quantity and quality of food needed; at the same time cities are growing and overtaking quality farm land.  Problems not unique to China but which are amplified by having 1.34 billion people living in a country that is about 300, 000 square kilometres smaller than Canada (by comparison the population of Canada is only 34.6 million people).  2500 people every hour are leaving the Chinese countryside and moving to cities; where jobs are higher paying, more plentiful and working conditions are deemed superior.  No other country in the world is dealing with migration issues such as this, ultimately putting further strain on the food demand as these people no long produce any food for their own consumption relying entirely on purchased products.  

The Chinese government seems genuinely concerned regarding how they are going to feed their population in the future and they are working towards solutions, including buying foreign land and working towards Free Trade Agreements with food exporting countries.  The question remains will it be enough?  

At the same time from what I saw, the government isn’t doing enough to nourish agriculture on home soil.  Farmers, businesses and investors are taking it upon themselves to build a modern agriculture industry.  They have come a long way but will it be enough?  How can they continue to grow when the land is leased from the government for 70 years?  How can they keep healthy, productive soils when manure application is restricted?  How sustainable is it to continue to import alfalfa from the United States?  How will the horrific pollution problem affect the health of their animals, the ability of the plants to photosynthesize in the future?  

I feel they are at a fork in the road.  Turning around is not an option.  To the left lies continued reliance on imports to the point where the cities have swallowed all suitable farm land and the majority of the food required is produced offshore.  To the right lies a healthy agriculture industry, supported by Government, where imports are still needed but only to supplement what is produced for China by Chinese farmers.  Samuel Johnson said “Agriculture not only gives riches to a nation, but the only riches she can call her own.”  

It will be interesting to see which direction China takes.  She will always need imports, I’m not suggesting China will be self sufficient, no one is.  My hope for China is that they will create a thriving agriculture industry which has a bright future much like we are experiencing right now.