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After 40 years of reform and opening-up, China’s agricultural and rural development has made historic achievements and changes, bringing prosperity to millions of farmers across the nation.

Addressing the grand gathering on December 18, 2018, to celebrate the 40th anniversary of reform and opening-up, President Xi Jinping said that the Chinese people have emancipated their minds, sought truth from facts, and dared to make changes to create a new world in the past 40 years.

Specifically, the president noted that the nation’s rural reform has made progress. The household-based contract responsibility system, the rise of rural enterprises, the cancellation of a series of agricultural taxes, and the protection of personal interests in contracted rural land, Xi noted, are examples of success in rural reform, adding that the nation has also fought hard in combating poverty and pushing forward its rural revitalization strategy.

Under the household-based contract responsibility system, land is leased to families in return for delivery of fixed output quotas, which has helped rural residents increase output to not only meet their own needs, but also to accumulate surpluses for market-based sales.

“It’s like a dream. I can earn 200,000 yuan ($29,000) a year now as a farmer,” said Cheng Xibing, a rice farmer from Xiaogang Village, where the system was first launched in 1978.

The reform has helped more than 1.3 billion Chinese people bid farewell to long-term agricultural product shortages. The country’s total grain output has successively reached a new level, ensuring national food security.

In 1978, the country’s total grain output was only more than 300 billion kilograms. By 1984, it reached more than 400 billion kilograms. Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, total grain output has stood steadily above the threshold of 600 billion kilograms for seven consecutive years from 2012 to 2018, indicating that China’s grain production capacity is stable and the grain production base is solid.

According to Han Changfu, China’s agricultural minister, the production of major agricultural products has leapt to the forefront of the world. Moreover, the contribution rate of agricultural science and technology progress has reached 57.5 percent and the comprehensive mechanization level of farming and harvesting has exceeded 66 percent.