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Agriculture has been a cornerstone of thePeople's Republic of China (PRC)'s economy and culture for millennia, supporting one of the world's largest populations and driving economic development. The country produces a diverse range of crops, includingrice,wheat,corn,potatoes,soybeans,tomatoes,millet,cotton,tea,fruits,vegetables, andoilseeds. Due to limited arable land—which constitutes roughly 10% of China's total land area—intensive farming practices, innovative agricultural technologies, and efficient land-use management have historically been critical in meeting domestic food demands.
China's agricultural history dates back to theNeolithic era, with archaeological evidence showing early domestication and cultivation of rice andmillet. Over the centuries, agricultural innovations such as themoldboard plow, advancedirrigation systems, andcrop rotation significantly enhanced productivity and supported population growth. In the modern era, agriculture was notably impacted by state-led policies, including land reforms in the early years of the PRC, thecollectivization efforts of theGreat Leap Forward, and subsequent reforms such as the Family Production Responsibility System introduced during China's economic liberalization beginning in 1978.
Today, agriculture remains a critical sector in China, employing approximately 40% of the workforce. In recent decades, challenges includingurbanization, loss of agricultural land to industrial expansion,climate change, water scarcity, food safety concerns, and inefficiencies in agricultural markets have influenced both policy and practice. To address these issues, the government has promoted innovations such asorganic farming,peri-urban agriculture, and advanced seed technologies, aiming to secure food production, reduce dependency on imports, and improve rural livelihoods. China is currently the world's largest producer of numerous agricultural commodities and is a major participant in global agricultural trade, significantly affecting international markets due to its sizable production and consumption volumes.
The development of farming over the course ofChina's history has played a key role in supporting the growth of one of the largest populations in the world.
Analysis of stone tools by ProfessorLiu Li and others has shown thathunter-gatherers 23,000–19,500 years ago ground wild plants with the same tools that would later be used for millet and rice.[1]
Domesticated millet varietiesPanicum miliaceum andSetaria italica may have originated in Northern China.[2] Remains of domesticatedmillet have been found in northern China atXinglonggou,Yuezhang,Dadiwan,Cishan, and severalPeiligang sites. These sites cover a period over 7250-6050BCE.[3] The amount of domesticated millet eaten at these sites was proportionally quite low compared to other plants. At Xinglonggou, millet made up only 15% of all plant remains around7200-6400 BCE; a ratio that changed to 99% by 2050-1550 BCE.[4] Experiments have shown that millet requires very little human intervention to grow, which means that obvious changes in the archaeological record that could demonstrate millet was being cultivated do not exist.[3]
Excavations atKuahuqiao, the earliest knownNeolithic site in eastern China, have documented rice cultivation 7,700 years ago.[5] Approximately half of the plant remains belonged to domesticatedjaponica species, whilst the other half were wild types of rice. It is possible that the people at Kuahuqiao also cultivated the wild type.[3] Finds at sites of theHemudu Culture (c. 5500-3300 BCE) inYuyao andBanpo nearXi'an includemillet and spade-like tools made of stone and bone. Evidence of settled rice agriculture has been found at the Hemudu site of Tianluoshan (5000-4500 BCE), with rice becoming the backbone of the agricultural economy by theMajiabang culture insouthern China.[6] According to theRecords of the Grand Historian some female prisoners in historic times were given the punishment to be "grain pounders" (Chinese:刑舂) as an alternative to more severe corporal punishment like tattooing or cutting off a foot. Some scholars believe the four or five year limits on these hard labor sentences began withEmperor Wen's legal reforms.[7]
There is also a long tradition involvingagriculture in Chinese mythology. In his book Permanent Agriculture: Farmers of Forty Centuries (1911), ProfessorFranklin Hiram King described and extolled the values of the traditional farming practices ofChina.[8]
Farming in China has always been verylabor-intensive. However, throughout its history, various methods have been developed or imported that enabled greater farming production and efficiency. They also utilized theseed drill to help improve on row farming.
During theSpring and Autumn period (722–481 BC), two revolutionary improvements infarming technology took place. One was the use ofcast iron tools andbeasts of burden to pull plows, and the other was the large-scale harnessing of rivers and development ofwater conservation projects. The engineerSunshu Ao of the 6th century BC andXimen Bao of the 5th century BC are two of the oldest hydraulic engineers from China, and their works were focused on improvingirrigation systems.[9] These developments were widely spread during the ensuingWarring States period (403–221 BC), culminating in the enormousDu Jiang Yan Irrigation System engineered byLi Bing by 256 BC for theState of Qin in ancientSichuan.
For agricultural purposes the Chinese had invented the hydraulic-poweredtrip hammer by the 1st century BC, during the ancientHan dynasty (202 BC-220 AD).[10] Although it found other purposes, its main function was to pound, decorticate, and polish grain that otherwise would have been done manually. The Chinese also innovated the square-palletchain pump by the 1st century AD, powered by awaterwheel oroxen pulling on a system of mechanical wheels.[11] Although the chain pump found use inpublic works of providing water for urban and palatialpipe systems,[12] it was used largely to lift water from a lower to higher elevation in filling irrigationcanals andchannels forfarmland.[13]
Chinese ploughs from Han times on fulfil all these conditions of efficiency nicely, which is presumably why the standard Han plough team consisted of two animals only, and later teams usually of a single animal, rather than the four, six or eight draught animals common in Europe before the introduction of the curved mould-board and other new principles of design in the + 18th century. Though the mould-board plough first appeared in Europe in early medieval, if not in late Roman, times, pre-eighteenth century mould-boards were usually wooden and straight (Fig. 59). The enormous labour involved in pulling such a clumsy construction necessitated large plough-teams, and this meant that large areas of land had to be reserved as pasture. In China, where much less animal power was required, it was not necessary to maintain the mixed arable-pasture economy typical of Europe: fallows could be reduced and the arable area expanded, and a considerably larger population could be supported than on the same amount of land in Europe.[14]
— Francesca Bray
During theEastern Jin (317–420) and theNorthern and Southern Dynasties (420–589), theSilk Road and other international trade routes further spread farming technology throughout China. Political stability and a growing labor force led to economic growth, and people opened up large areas of wasteland and built irrigation works for expanded agricultural use. As land-use became more intensive and efficient, rice was grown twice a year and cattle began to be used forplowing andfertilization.
By theTang dynasty (618–907), China had become a unified feudal agricultural society again. Improvements in farming machinery during this era included themoldboard plow andwatermill. Later during theYuan dynasty (1271–1368), cotton planting and weaving technology were extensively adopted and improved.
While around 750, 75% of China's population lived north of the riverYangtze, by 1250, 75% of the population lived south of the river. Such large-scale internal migration was possible due to the introduction of quick-ripening strains of rice from Vietnam suitable for multi-cropping.[15] This is also possibly the result of Northern China falling to invaders. With the hardships that come from conflict, many Chinese may have moved South to not starve.
The Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties had seen the rise of collective help organizations between farmers.[16]
In 1909 US Professor of AgricultureFranklin Hiram King made an extensive tour of China (as well as Japan and briefly Korea) and he described contemporary agricultural practices. He favourably described the farming of China as 'permanent agriculture' and his book 'Farmers of Forty Centuries', published posthumously in 1911, has become an agricultural classic and has been a favoured reference source fororganic farming advocates. The book has inspired manycommunity-supported agriculture farmers in China to conductecological farming.[17]
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Following theChinese Communist Party's victory in theChinese Civil War, control of the farmlands was taken away from landlords and redistributed to the 300 million peasant farmers,[18] including purges of landlords during theLand Reform Movement. In 1952, gradually consolidating its power following the civil war, the government began organizing the peasants into teams. Three years later, these teams were combined into producer cooperatives, enacting thesocialist goal of collective land ownership. In the following year, 1956, the government formally took control of the land, further structuring the farmland into large government-operated collective farms.
Collectivization was a factor in the most important change in Chinese agriculture in the dramatic increase in irrigated land during the early and mid-1950s.[19]: 111 Collectivization also helped facilitate the labor-intensive practice ofdouble-cropping in southern China, which greatly increased agricultural yields.[19]: 116
In the 1958 "Great Leap Forward" campaign initiated byChairman of the Chinese Communist PartyMao Zedong, land use was placed under closer government control in an effort to improve agricultural output. In particular, theFour Pests campaign and mass eradication of sparrows had a direct negative impact on agriculture. Collectives were organized intocommunes, private food production was banned, and collective eating was required. Greater emphasis was also put onindustrialization instead of agriculture. The farming inefficiencies created by this campaign led to theGreat Chinese Famine, resulting in the deaths of somewhere between the government estimate of 14 million to scholarly estimates of 20 to 43 million.[20] Although private plots of land were re-instated in 1962 due to this failure, communes remained the dominant rural unit of economic organization during theCultural Revolution, with Mao championing the "Learn from Dazhai in agriculture" campaign. Tachai's semi-literate party secretaryChen Yonggui was among those outmaneuvered byDeng Xiaoping after the death of Mao: from 1982 to 1985, theDazhai-style communes were gradually replaced bytownships.
Beginning in 1978, as part of theFour Modernizations campaign, the Family Production Responsibility System was created, dismantling communes and giving agricultural production responsibility back to individual households. Households are now given crop quotas that they were required to provide to their collective unit in return for tools, draft animals, seeds, and other essentials. Households, which now lease land from their collectives, are free to use their farmland however they see fit as long as they meet these quotas. This freedom has given more power to individual families to meet their individual needs. In addition to these structural changes, the Chinese government also engages inirrigation projects (such as theThree Gorges Dam), runs large state farms, and encouragesmechanization andfertilizer use.[21]
By 1984, when about 99% of farm production teams had adopted the Family Production Responsibility System, the government began further economic reforms, aimed primarily at liberalizing agricultural pricing and marketing. In 1984, the government replaced mandatory procurement with voluntary contracts between farmers and the government. Later, in 1993, the government abolished the 40-year-old grain rationing system, leading to more than 90 percent of all annual agricultural produce to be sold at market-determined prices.
Since 1994, the government has instituted a number of policy changes aimed at limiting grain importation and increasing economic stability. Among these policy changes was the artificial increase of grain prices above market levels. This has led to increased grain production, while placing the heavy burden of maintaining these prices on the government. In 1995, the "Governor's Grain Bag Responsibility System" was instituted, holding provincial governors responsible for balancing grain supply and demand and stabilizing grain prices in their provinces. Later, in 1997, the "Four Separations and One Perfection" program was implemented to relieve some of the monetary burdens placed on the government by its grain policy.[22]
As China continues to industrialize, vast swaths of agricultural land are being converted into industrial land. Farmers displaced by such urban expansion often becomemigrant labor forfactories, but other farmers feel disenfranchised and cheated by the encroachment of industry and the growing disparity between urban and rural wealth and income.[23]
The most recent innovation in Chinese agriculture is a push intoorganic agriculture.[24] This rapid embrace of organic farming simultaneously serves multiple purposes, including food safety, health benefits, export opportunities, and, by providing price premiums for the produce of rural communities, the adoption of organics can help stem the migration of rural workers to the cities.[24] In the mid-1990s China became a net importer of grain, since its unsustainable practises of groundwater mining has effectively removed considerable land from productive agricultural use.[citation needed]
As of 2023, approximately 40% of China's workforce is engaged in farming, primarily at small scale.[25]: 174 Agricultural production accounts for less than 9% of China's GDP.[25]: 174
Although China's agricultural output is the largest in the world, only 10% of its total land area can be cultivated. China's arable land, which represents 10% of the total arable land in the world, supports over 20% of the world's population.[26] Of this approximately 1.4 million square kilometers of arable land, only about 1.2% (116,580 square kilometers) permanently supports crops and 525,800 square kilometers are irrigated.[citation needed] The land is divided into approximately 200 million households, with an average land allocation of just 0.65 hectares (1.6 acres).
China's limited space for farming has been a problem throughout its history, leading to chronic food shortage and famine. While the production efficiency of farmland has grown over time, efforts to expand to the west and the north have met with limited success, as such land is generally colder and drier than traditional farmlands to the east. Since the 1950s, farm space has also been pressured by the increasing land needs of industry and cities.
Such increases in the sizes of cities, such as the administrative district ofBeijing's increase from 4,822 km2 (1,862 sq mi) in 1956 to 16,808 km2 (6,490 sq mi) in 1958, has led to the increased adoption ofperi-urban agriculture. Such "suburban agriculture" led to more than 70% of non-staple food in Beijing, mainly consisting of vegetables and milk, to be produced by the city itself in the 1960s and 1970s. Recently, with relative food security in China, periurban agriculture has led to improvements in the quality of the food available, as opposed to quantity. One of the more recent experiments in urban agriculture is the Modern Agricultural Science Demonstration Park inXiaotangshan.[27]
About 75% of China's cultivated area is used for food crops.Rice is China's most important crop, raised on about 25% of the cultivated area. The majority of rice is grown south of theHuai River, in theZhu Jiang delta, and in theYunnan,Guizhou, andSichuan provinces.
Wheat is the second most-prevalent grain crop, grown in most parts of the country but especially on theNorth China Plain, theWei andFen River valleys on theLoess plateau, and inJiangsu,Hubei, and Sichuan provinces.Corn andmillet are grown in north and northeast China, andoats are important inInner Mongolia andTibet.
Other crops include sweet potatoes in the south, whitepotatoes in the north (China is the largest producer of potatoes in the world), and various other fruits and vegetables. Tropical fruits are grown onHainan Island,apples andpears are grown in northernLiaoning andShandong.
Oil seeds are important in Chinese agriculture, supplying edible and industrial oils and forming a large share of agricultural exports. In North and Northeast China, Chinese soybeans are grown to be used in tofu and cooking oil. China is also a leading producer of peanuts, which are grown in Shandong and Hebei provinces. Other oilseed crops aresesame seeds,sunflower seeds,rapeseed, and the seeds of thetung tree.
Citrus is a major cash crop in southern China, with production scattered along and south of the Yangtze River valley.Mandarins are the most popular citrus in China, with roughly double the output of oranges.[28]
Other important food crops for China includegreen andjasmine teas (popular among the Chinese population),black tea (as an export),sugarcane, andsugar beets. Tea plantations are located on the hillsides of the middle Yangtze Valley and in the southeast provinces ofFujian andZhejiang. Sugarcane is grown inGuangdong and Sichuan, while sugar beets are raised inHeilongjiang province and on irrigated land in Inner Mongolia.Lotus is widely cultivated throughout southern China.[29][30]
Arabica coffee is grown in the southwestern province ofYunnan.[31] Much smaller plantations also exist inHainan andFujian.[32]
China is the leading producer ofcotton, which is grown throughout, but especially in the areas of the North China Plain, the Yangtze river delta, the middle Yangtze valley, and theXinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. Other fiber crops includeramie,flax,jute, andhemp.Sericulture, the practice of silkworm raising, is also practiced in central and southern China.
China has a large livestock population, withpigs andfowls being the most common. China's pig population and pork production mainly lie along the Yangtze River. In 2011, Sichuan province had 51 million pigs (11% of China's total supply).[33] In rural western China,sheep,goats, andcamels are raised bynomadic herders.[34] In Tibet,yaks are raised as a source of food, fuel, and shelter.Cattle,water buffalo,horses,mules, anddonkeys are also raised in China, anddairy has recently been encouraged by the government, even though approximately 92.3% of the adult population is affected by some level oflactose intolerance.
As demand for gourmet foods grows, production of more exotic meats increases as well. Based on survey data from 684 Chineseturtle farms (less than half of the all 1,499 officially registeredturtle farms in the year of the survey, 2002), they sold over 92,000 tons of turtles (around 128 million animals) per year; this is thought to correspond to the industrial total of over 300 million turtles per year.[35]
Increased incomes and increased demand for meat, especially pork, has resulted in demand for improved breeds of livestock, breeding stock imported particularly from the United States. Some of these breeds are adapted tofactory farming.[36]
China accounts for about one-third of the total fish production of the world.Aquaculture, the breeding of fish in ponds and lakes, accounts for more than half of its output. The principal aquaculture-producing regions are close to urban markets in the middle and lower Yangtze valley and the Zhu Jiang delta.
In its first fifty years, thePeople's Republic of China greatly increased agricultural production through organizational and technological improvements. As of at least 2022, China produces almost all of its own food and non-soybean feed.[19]: 230
| Crop[37] | 1949 Output (tons) | 1978 Output (tons) | 1999 Output (tons) | |
| 1. | Grain | 113,180,000 | 304,770,000 | 508,390,000 |
| 2. | Cotton | 444,000 | 2,167,000 | 3,831,000 |
| 3. | Oil-bearing crops | 2,564,000 | 5,218,000 | 26,012,000 |
| 4. | Sugarcane | 2,642,000 | 21,116,000 | 74,700,000 |
| 5. | Sugarbeet | 191,000 | 2,702,000 | 8,640,000 |
| 6. | Flue-cured tobacco | 43,000 | 1,052,000 | 2,185,000 |
| 7. | Tea | 41,000 | 268,000 | 676,000 |
| 8. | Fruit | 1,200,000 | 6,570,000 | 62,376,000 |
| 9. | Meat | 2,200,000 | 8,563,000 | 59,609,000 |
| 10. | Aquatic products | 450,000 | 4,660,000 | 41,220,000 |
As of 2011, China was both the world's largest producer and consumer of agricultural products.[38][39] However, the researcher Lin Erda has stated a projected fall of possibly 14% to 23% by 2050 due to water shortages and other impacts by climate change; China has increased the budget for agriculture by 20% in 2009, and continues to support energy efficiency measures, renewable technology, and other efforts with investments, such as the over 30% green component of the $586bn fiscal stimulus package announced in November 2008.[40]
In 2018:[41]
In addition to smaller productions of other agricultural products.[41]
Throughout China's history, its relative lack of arable land has been a challenge.[42] China has about 22% of the world population, but must feed it with only 9% of the world's arable land.[42] China's water resources are likewise limited, as it has only 6% of the world's water supply.[42]
Despite rapid growth in output, the Chinese agricultural sector still faces several challenges. Farmers in several provinces, such asShandong,Zhejiang,Anhui,Liaoning, andXinjiang often have a hard time selling their agricultural products to customers due to a lack of information about current conditions.[43]
Between the producing farmer in the countryside and the end-consumer in the cities there is a chain ofintermediaries.[43] Because a lack of information flows through them, farmers find it difficult to foresee the demand for different types of fruits and vegetables. In order to maximize their profits they, therefore, opt to produce those fruits and vegetables that created the highest revenues for farmers in the region in the previous year. If, however, most farmers do so, this causes the supply of fresh products to fluctuate substantially year on year. Relatively scarce products in one year are produced in excess the following year because of expected higherprofit margins. The resulting excess supply, however, forces farmers to reduce their prices and sell at a loss. The scarce, revenue creating products of one year become the over-abundant, loss-making products in the following, and vice versa.[44]
Efficiency is further impaired in the transportation of agricultural products from the farms to the actual markets. According to figures from the Commerce Department, up to 25% of fruits and vegetables rot before being sold, compared to around 5% in a typical developed country. As intermediaries cannot sell these rotten fruits they pay farmers less than they would if able to sell all or most of the fruits and vegetables. This reduces farmer's revenues although the problem is caused by post-production inefficiencies, which they are not themselves aware of during price negotiations with intermediaries.[45]
These information and transportation problems highlight inefficiencies in the market mechanisms between farmers and end-consumers, impeding farmers from taking advantage of the fast development of the rest of the Chinese economy. The resulting small profit margin does not allow them to invest in the necessary agricultural inputs (machinery, seeds, fertilizers, etc.) to raise their productivity and improve their standards of living, from which the whole of the Chinese economy would benefit. This in turn increases the exodus of people from the countryside to the cities, which already faceurbanization issues.[46]
In a speech in September 2020,General Secretary of the Chinese Communist PartyXi Jinping directed China's scientists to researchseed farming. He noted that the country relies onimported seed and said that its scientists must help remedy this situation.[47]
The negative effects on China's agriculture caused by climate change have appeared. There was an increase in agricultural production instability, severe damages caused by high temperature and drought, and lower production and quality in the prairie. In the near future, climate change may cause negative influences, causing a reduction of output in wheat, rice, and corn, and change the agricultural distribution of production.[48] China is also dealing with agricultural issues due global demands of products such as soybeans. This global demand is causing coupled effects that stretch across oceans which in turn is affecting other countries.[citation needed]
Over the past 70 years, climate change seriously reduced China's food security, mainly by inducingdrought andflooding. Flooding decreased the yields of rice by 8% over the last 20 years. As China is the biggest food producer and importer in the world, what happens in the agricultural sector of China has an immediate effect on the global food system. China increased its grain self sufficiency by expanding agriculture areas to regions with less rain, giving them water withirrigation systems. Now those fields are at risk from water shortage while the irrigation systems demand huge amounts of water what cause depletion ofgroundwater in many regions. The government of China is trying to address the problem by different measures like reducingfood waste, increasinginternational cooperation. But some of the measures like using morefertilizers produced from coal can exacerbate the problem.[49]
China is the world's largest importer ofsoybeans and other food crops,[50] and is expected to become the top importer of farm products within the next decade.[51] In a speech in September 2020, CCP leader Xi Jinping lamented the country's reliance onimported seed.[47]
While most years China's agricultural production is sufficient to feed the country, in down years, China has to import grain. Due to the shortage of available farm land and an abundance of labor, it might make more sense to import land-extensive crops (such as wheat and rice) and to save China's scarce cropland forhigh-value export products, such as fruits, nuts, or vegetables. In order to maintain grain independence and ensurefood security, however, the Chinese government has enforced policies that encourage grain production at the expense of more-profitable crops. Despite heavy restrictions on crop production, China's agricultural exports have greatly increased in recent years.[52]
One important motivator of increased international trade was China's inclusion in theWorld Trade Organization (WTO) on December 11, 2001, leading to reduced or eliminated tariffs on much of China's agricultural exports. Due to the resulting opening of international markets to Chinese agriculture, by 2004 the value of China's agricultural exports exceeded $17.3 billion (US). Since China's inclusion in the WTO, its agricultural trade has not beenliberalized to the same extent as itsmanufactured goods trade.Markets within China are still relatively closed-off to foreign companies. Due to its large and growing population, it is speculated that if its agricultural markets were opened, China would become a consistent net importer of food, possibly destabilizing theworld food market. The barriers enforced by the Chinese government on grains are not transparent because China's state trading in grains is conducted through its Cereal, Oil, and Foodstuffs Importing and Exporting Corporation (COFCO).[53]
In the early 2000s, excessive pesticide residues, low food hygiene, unsafe additives,contamination withheavy metals and other contaminants and misuse of veterinary drugs had led to trade restrictions with some nations such as Japan, the United States, and the European Union.[54] These problems have also led to public outcry, such as in themelamine-tainted dog food scare and the carcinogenic-tainted seafood import restriction, leading to measures such as the "China-free" label.[55] In the milk scandal in China in 2008, many children became ill due to consumption of melamine-contaminated milk products, and a number of domestic dairy brands were found to contain melamine in their products, leading many countries to ban the import of Chinese dairy products.[56]
In 2011,About one tenth of China's farmland is contaminated with heavy metals, according to theMinistry of Environmental Protection of the People's Republic of China.[57]
China has developed a Green Food program where produce is certified for low pesticide input.[24] This has been articulated into Green food Grade A and Grade AA. This Green Food AA standard has been aligned with IFOAM international standards for organic farming and has formed the basis of the rapid expansion of organic agriculture in China.[24]
China'sorganic food production has experienced a rapid expansion in the 2010s, largely attributed to the booming domestic market due to the heightened food safety problem. In many cases, organic food production is organized by organic food companies leasing land from small scale farmers. Farmers' cooperatives and contract farming are also found to be common organizational structures of organic farming in China. The Chinese government has provided various policy and financial supports for the development of the organic sector. In recent years, non-certified organic production in diverse forms such aspermaculture andnatural farming is also emerging in China, often initiated by entrepreneurs or civil society organizations.[58]
{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: DOI inactive as of February 2025 (link)He said that some of the main areas of research should be to overcome the agricultural sector's reliance on imported seed...
