In the integrated agriculture of America, all the work (from pre-production to post-production) formerly done by farmers themselves has replaced by the special service organizations or companies, which can compose an organic whole including the supply of agricultural means of production, agricultural production, transport and storage of agricultural products, processing and packaging of agricultural products, and even sales links. Japan’s
“National Agricultural Cooperative Federation” is the farmer’s own organizational system, which covers all areas of rural and agricultural production in Japan and attracts almost all the farmers to participate in. It not only plays an important role in Japan’s rural economy and agricultural logistics, but also brings enormous political influence.
Both the “vertical and horizontal integration” of American agricultural logistics and Japan’s “National Agricultural Cooperative Federation” show the importance of building the agricultural logistics organization.
Agricultural logistics organizations, such as co-operative Society and the National Agricultural Cooperative Federation, have played tremendous roles during the development of agricultural logistics as well as the impact to farmers, market and government. Such cooperative organizations are farmers’ own organizations so that they can protect the interests of the farmers better. Through the sharing of logistics resources, farmers can achieve scale economies, reduce costs and improve their anti-risk ability so as to obtain the ultimate purpose of increasing revenue.
With lower level, less number and smaller scale, Chinese agricultural organizations of logistics cannot provide good and competitive service to agricultural production. Therefore, on the one hand, conform to the requirements of social development and continue to develop the organizations outside the farmers, such as the third-party logistics organization; on the other hand, we should encourage farmers to organize by themselves and develop “self-organization”, such as supply and marketing cooperatives in rural areas, which can play its “three rural” role. In particular, we should give priority to developing new forms of farmers’ cooperation organizations
and rural cooperative economic organizations as well as policy and legal support. This can encourage farmers to participate in the market environment actively, improve their organization degree of participation, and play the strength of peasant organizations. As a result, we can improve the efficiency of agricultural logistics and ensure the protection of farmers’ interests.
3. Promote industrialized operation of agriculture, increase the added value of agricultural products
From the practical experience of the United States and other developed countries, we can infer that industrialization of agriculture has greatly promoted the development of agriculture. The industrialization of agriculture is oriented by domestic and foreign markets and enhances economic efficiency as its center. Implement policies such as regional distribution, specialized production, integrated operation, social services and enterprise management and combine production, supply and marketing, trade, industry and agriculture, economy, science and education all together to form the one-stop operating system.(SONG Ying-jie & CHEN Yin-chun, 2006) In the traditional system, China’s agricultural departments from pre-production to post-production are divided.
Peasants are dispersed and can only offer the primary products, which causes low added value of agricultural products and weak ability of farmers to enter the market. For example, agricultural sectors sell agricultural means of production with high price; processing, transportation and sales departments of agricultural products buy agricultural products with low price.
In the conditions of industrialized operation of agriculture, agricultural sectors from pre-production to post-production have an organic connection to form a complete industrial chain. For example, agricultural production combining with processing, and distribution sectors can form an agricultural model of logistics
“leading enterprises + farmers”. With all-round combination of modern high-tech and agriculture, on the one hand farmers and the industrial & commercial organization will become the community with common interests to share the value-added of agricultural products brought about by a complete industrial chain of agriculture; on the other hand, with the deep and fine processing of agricultural products, the agricultural industry chain will be extend; the increment of agricultural products will be increased; new areas of market will be expanded. Finally, the increment of agricultural products and the gain to farmers’ income can be achieved. At the same time, because of the internalization of external trade, there will be a reduction of trade links and transaction costs. As a result, the cost of agricultural products to enter the market will be reduced. Besides, as the industrial management of agriculture promotes rural secondary and tertiary industries and adds jobs, it can help us to solve transfer problems of rural surplus labor and increase ways for farmers to get rich.
4. Establish an agricultural buying and selling system of “modern business-driven”, develop new agriculture, new rural areas and new farmers
In America’s agricultural logistics organization, the Commonwealth of Agriculture “Contract” is that industrial and commercial enterprises sign cooperation contracts with farmers, which joins production, supply and marketing as an organic whole. According to production features, the purchase-sale network and best-selling system of industrial products established by industrial and commercial enterprises operate the logistics. By the same token, according to the strong contrast that commercial and service industry in urban has rapid development and keen competition but in rural has a serious shortage, we should reconsider the rational distribution of business
Using the practice of foreign agricultural logistics for reference
59 resources from the angle of the urban-rural integration and the establishment of a best-selling system to encourage trade and service system to breakthrough the limits of urban and rural areas, the ownership and authorities and set up modern commercial outlets such as chain stores in rural areas with multi-channel extension and infiltration.
We should take service industry of modern trade as the start point; increase multi-channel input to establish purchase and sale network and best-selling system of agricultural and industrial products such as the “marriage”
of urban & rural, agriculture & business and agricultural & trade; achieve specialization, scale, diversification and modernization of rural business services system in a multiple way. In this way, not only can the excessive competitive situation when city business and service industries go into the rural market be changed, but also modern commercial awareness, business experience, market information and technical knowledge in urban can be widely spread to speed up the commercialization, marketing and modernization process in rural areas. Developing new agriculture and rural areas of “modern business-driven” and breeding new farmers are not only the objective requirements of market economy in the new era but also the only way to achieve the development of agriculture, rural prosperity and well-off farmers.(SONG Ze, 2004)
Currency circulation is the continuous exchange of goods taking money as its media, which is also an important link in the process of social reproduction. Commodities in rural areas consider meeting the farmers in production and daily life needs as the main content, including sales of agricultural products, consumer goods marketing, supply of production means, logistics services and other related technical services combining with goods. The essence of difficulties for farmers to buy and sell performs as such following problems: backward of agricultural production ways, low level of agricultural products’ commercialization, farmers’ shortage of market awareness and low-income of farmers. Circulation modernization is the protection of sustainable development of rural economy and important way to solve the “three rural” issue, increase farmer’s income and get the
“Hematopoietic capability” to develop rural economy.
References:
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Jonah C. Tyan, Fu-Kwun Wang & Timon C Du. (2003). An evaluation of freight consolidation policies in global third party logistics.
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James C. Johnson. Contemporary logistics. Prentice Hall Upper Saddle River NJ 07458, 540-541.
LIU Xu, HE Li-hui & OUYANG Qiang-bin. (2004). Learn from the experience of the Netherlands to speed up the logistics development of China’s agriculture. Agriculture Around the World, 9.
SONG Ying-jie & CHEN Yin-chun. (2006). Overview of agricultural industrialization. Chinese Society Press.
SONG Ze. (2004). Innovation report. Chinese People’s University Press.
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(Edited by Emily and Nancy)