China's rural development challenges: land tenure reform and local institutional experimentation

Despite its unprecedented achievements in rural development, China remains a lower-middle income country. Unsound practices in farmland use and management have contributed to farmland loss, rising social conflicts and deprivation of the landless, which perpetuates rural poverty and land tenure insecurity of the weak and poor. The current hybrid land tenure systems characterized by collective ownership and individual use rights exert both positive and negative effects on land governance. China’s approach to land laws, policies and institutional reforms is characterized by inherent weaknesses which impede the strengthening of peasants’ rights and collective action in the process. With the simplistic assumption on the importance of land tenure to facilitate its transferability and scaled agricultural production, the current reform is undergoing a risky transformation that may backfire. In this sense, the Chinese approach bears resemblances with other countries whose experiences have failed the poor and have produced unintended consequences. In essence, the failure to take into account the livelihoods of the poor especially from sustainable land use perspectives exemplifies their pursuit of short-term gains rather than longer-term solutions to complex rural development issues. The challenges confronting China’s rural development require a renewed understanding of what constitutes an appropriate land tenure system that suits the local conditions of a given community. This needs a holistic study of what kind of land tenure systems exist in China, how they have worked in the past, what their problems are, and how they can be redressed to suit the needs of the poor. Zie: Summary