What should we learn from the "Ten Million Project" in the beautiful transformation of rural areas in Zhejiang? Engineering | China | Beauty
Core viewpoint: Pan Helin, a columnist on China Economic Net, believes that Zhejiang has made long-term contributions, continuously promoted the "Ten Million Project", created thousands of beautiful rural areas, and benefited thousands of farmers. The good experiences and practices from the "Ten Million Project" will provide more reference for comprehensively promoting rural revitalization and building a beautiful China.
The beautiful transformation of rural areas in Zhejiang began with the "Thousand Village Demonstration and Ten Thousand Village Renovation" project.
The "Thousand Village Demonstration and Ten Thousand Village Renovation" project launched in June 2003 in Zhejiang Province selected about 10000 administrative villages from 40000 villages in the province for comprehensive renovation, and built around 1000 central villages into comprehensive well-off demonstration villages. As of the end of 2022, more than 90% of villages in Zhejiang Province have met the standards for beautiful rural areas in the new era. 70 demonstration counties, 724 demonstration towns, 743 scenic spots, 2170 characteristic boutique villages, and over 3 million beautiful courtyards have been established.
From the practice in Zhejiang, we have found an answer to doing a good job in agriculture, rural areas, and farmers.
On the one hand, rural areas should have good prospects. Nowadays, rural infrastructure in Zhejiang has been comprehensively improved, with a 100% proportion of rural roads and 99.99% reliability of rural power grid supply. The coverage rate of large-scale water supply in urban and rural areas has reached 90%. As of the end of 2022, the total income of rural collectives in Zhejiang Province reached 76 billion yuan, and the total assets of village level collectives reached 880 billion yuan. On the other hand, farmers need to have hope. In 2022, the per capita disposable income of farmers in Zhejiang reached 37565 yuan, leading the provinces and regions in China for three consecutive years. The income ratio of urban and rural residents in Zhejiang has decreased from 2.43 in 2003 to 1.90 in 2022, lower than the national average of 2.45, and has been decreasing for ten consecutive years.
More importantly, agriculture should have a promising future. The rapid development of rural areas has made agriculture a choice for many young people. Data shows that currently, Zhejiang Province has cultivated over 47000 agricultural innovators. It can be said that the "blue ocean" in the agricultural field is beginning to be noticed and explored by the market. With the gradual development and growth of rural industries, there are more and more high-quality agricultural practitioners, and the flourishing situation of agriculture is accelerating.
How was all of these achieved? From the author's observation, there are some experiences that can be referenced by various regions.
Firstly, it is necessary to establish a sustainable policy assistance system and avoid short-term support with a hammer in the east and a hammer in the west. Since the implementation of the "Ten Million Project" in 2003, a targeted five-year plan has been deployed. By the end of 2010, the "Zhejiang Province Beautiful Rural Construction Action Plan" was released, followed by the introduction of new action plans in 2016. In 2018, the "Comprehensive Implementation of the Rural Revitalization Strategy and High level Promotion of Agricultural and Rural Modernization Action Plan" was further formulated. It can be seen that the relevant plans have strong continuity, and the new plans include a summary of the previous stage's experience, a compilation of problems, and solutions for the new stage. A blueprint has been drawn to the end, forming a scientific policy assistance system that progresses layer by layer and keeps pace with the times.
Secondly, we must adhere to a problem oriented approach, making policies more effective and planning more effective. To solve rural problems, we need to find problems from the countryside, understand problems from farmers, and discover problems from reality. For example, Zhejiang Province has held on-site promotion meetings for the "Ten Million Project" for twenty consecutive years, strengthening the responsibility mechanism of party and government leadership, coordination among all parties, and hierarchical responsibility, allowing farmers to truly reflect on problems, and formulating targeted solutions and assigning work tasks.
Thirdly, we need to have a global awareness, demonstrate first before promoting, and avoid making decisions based on impulsive thinking. Ten thousand villages are renovated, ten thousand villages are covered. Different geographical locations and development stages will face different problems. Therefore, rural governance should not only adhere to a "global awareness", but also encourage rural areas to explore their own development paths independently, and build villages and towns with excellent performance and promotion value into beautiful rural demonstration villages and towns. At the same time, it is necessary to summarize the experience and lessons learned in the work process.
For the past 20 years, Zhejiang has been continuously promoting the "Ten Million Project", creating thousands of beautiful villages and benefiting thousands of farmers. We look forward to and believe that the good experiences and practices from the "Ten Million Project" will showcase new trends and achievements in the new journey of building a socialist modernized country, providing more reference for the comprehensive promotion of rural revitalization and the construction of a beautiful China.
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