Yang Guang, member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC): Promote the green and low-carbon transformation of agriculture in the Yangtze River Economic Belt
The Yangtze River Economic Belt has the unique advantages of traversing the east and west, undertaking the north and south, and connecting the rivers and the sea, and its high-quality development is related to the overall development of the country. At this year's National People's Congress and the National People's Congress, representatives and members of various provinces and cities along the Yangtze River have made suggestions and suggestions, and ecological protection, data sharing, shipping system, value conversion, and overall promotion have become the "high-frequency words" in this year's Yangtze River Economic Belt development proposals.
Located in the upper reaches of the Yangtze River, the representatives of Sichuan and Chongqing are also quite concerned about the high-quality development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt, and the delegations of the two places also jointly proposed to comprehensively improve the shipping capacity of the upper reaches of the Yangtze River.
During the 14th Five-Year Plan period, the Yangtze River Economic Belt has entered a critical period of comprehensive green and low-carbon transformation. The reporter learned that this year's National People's Political Consultative Conference, Yang Guang, member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, deputy chairman of the Chongqing Municipal Committee of the Democratic National Construction Association, and director of the Chongqing Municipal Ethnic and Religious Affairs Committee, submitted a number of suggestions for the low-carbon development and systematic protection of the Yangtze River Basin, one of which proposed to improve the three elements of science and technology, incentives, and data to promote the green and low-carbon transformation of agriculture in the Yangtze River Economic Belt.
"Agriculture is one of the main directions of carbon reduction, and it can also create carbon sinks. Yang Guang believes that in order to restore the ecological environment of the Yangtze River Economic Belt and promote ecological environmental protection and economic and social development as a whole, it is necessary to accelerate the green and low-carbon transformation of agriculture in the Yangtze River Economic Belt.
Lack of transformation incentives and data support
The Yangtze River Economic Belt is an important rice producing area in China, as well as a major producing area of various cash crops, aquatic products and livestock products, which plays a key role in maintaining national food security. In many top-level meetings on the deployment of the high-quality development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt, it was emphasized that the Yangtze River Economic Belt should play a greater role in maintaining national food security, energy security, important industrial and supply chain security, and water security.
"The main sources of greenhouse gas emissions in China's agriculture are precisely rice planting, fertilizer application, energy consumption of agricultural machinery and animal husbandry. Yang Guang believes that the climatic characteristics and resource conditions along the Yangtze River are more suitable for rice planting, and the planting and consumption habits formed over the years are difficult to change, and the input of key elements such as fertilizers, pesticides and agricultural machinery still plays an indispensable role in stabilizing and improving food production, so promoting the green and low-carbon transformation of agriculture in the Yangtze River Economic Belt is facing great constraints.
Yang Guang pointed out that although there are many mature new technologies, new elements and new farming systems for green and low-carbon agriculture, it is extremely challenging to control the replacement speed of traditional agricultural production methods and maintain the stability of agricultural production in the process of promoting the green and low-carbon transformation of agriculture in the Yangtze River Economic Belt.
At the same time, the low-carbon transformation of agriculture in the Yangtze River Economic Belt still lacks data support and incentive mechanisms for transformation.
"In terms of data support, we mainly face problems such as lagging data updates, high cost of agricultural carbon emission monitoring, insufficient technological development, and insufficient relevant talent reserves. Yang Guang said that the Yangtze River Economic Belt agricultural carbon emissions come from a variety of sources, and different emission sources require specific monitoring methods, which increases the complexity and cost of monitoring, and that agricultural activities are different in different regions and seasons in the Yangtze River Economic Belt, which requires monitoring activities to cover a wide range of geographical areas and time periods, which increase the cost of carbon emission monitoring along the route.
"There is also a lack of incentives for low-carbon transition. Yang Guang believes that the current demand for green and low-carbon agricultural products is low, and the high value of green and low-carbon agricultural products is difficult to achieve through market mechanisms, which is not enough to support large-scale green and low-carbon transformation of agriculture.
Yang Guang also pointed out that the current lack of a value realization mechanism for agricultural carbon sinks in the Yangtze River Economic Belt, the high cost of adopting low-carbon agricultural production technologies, and the lack of investment in green and low-carbon agricultural technologies and the ability to cope with market risks among smallholder farmers in the Yangtze River Economic Belt have inhibited the active transformation of smallholder farmers.
Develop new quality productive forces in agriculture
In the face of these constraints, Yang Guang believes that the formation of new agricultural productivity in the Yangtze River Economic Belt should be accelerated to drive agricultural emission reduction and efficiency.
"The main thing is to further promote the reduction and efficiency of chemical fertilizers, vigorously promote rice control irrigation technology, improve the penetration rate of smart agricultural machinery and electric agricultural machinery, and reduce direct carbon emissions in the agricultural production process. Yang Guang suggested that the livestock and poultry breeding industry in the Yangtze River Economic Belt should vigorously promote manure collaborative control, precision feeding, improve feed formula and other technologies to improve the efficiency of livestock and poultry breeding and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
In addition, Yang Guang also suggested improving the incentive mechanism for the green and low-carbon transformation of agriculture in the Yangtze River Economic Belt, and at the same time improving the level of agricultural carbon sink measurement and monitoring through the establishment of special scientific research projects and the establishment of an agricultural carbon sink data sharing platform in the Yangtze River Economic Belt.
"Differentiated support measures for green and low-carbon transformation of agriculture should be innovated, and soil subsidies should be closely linked to agricultural carbon reduction and carbon sequestration measures such as conservation tillage, straw returning, and organic fertilizer application, so as to reduce the cost of agricultural operators adopting green and low-carbon agricultural production technologies. Yang Guang suggested that the unification and internationalization of green and low-carbon agricultural product certification standards should be improved, the market and law enforcement of green and low-carbon agricultural products should be increased, the concept of green and low-carbon consumption should be advocated, and the demand for green and low-carbon agricultural products should be stimulated.
"At present, there are three pilot carbon markets in Shanghai, Chongqing and Hubei in the Yangtze River Economic Belt, and it is recommended to support these three pilot carbon markets to explore the establishment of an agricultural carbon sink trading platform. Yang Guang suggested that industrial enterprises and agricultural operators should be encouraged to cooperate, and use the carbon reduction generated by the low-carbon transformation of agriculture to help enterprises meet the emission reduction targets, which can also bring additional benefits to agricultural operators in green and low-carbon transformation.
