Rural land contract reform: separation of ownership rights, contractors' rights and land management rights

In the early years of the reform process, a household contract responsibility system was gradually implemented, separating ownership rights from land management rights, with the former belonging to collective entities, and the latter to individual households. This measure injected huge dynamism into agricultural production across the land, and helped effectively meet the most basic needs of the people, securing a great victory for rural reform. Currently, with a trend towards industrialization and urbanization, rural labor is flocking to cities and towns in large numbers. These developments underscore the need to further separate contractors’ rights from land management rights to reflect the fact that contractors may not necessary manage the land under contract themselves. In his speech at the fifth meeting of the Central Steering Group for In-depth Reform in September 2014, Xi Jinping called for a new system that ensures separation of contractors’ rights and land management rights in addition to ownership rights – which remain collective in nature – and allows transfer of land management rights. This represents yet another major innovation in rural reform following the rollout of the household contract responsibility system.

Separation of ownership rights, contractors’ rights and land management rights contributes to rural governance, and reflects the need for production relations to evolve in response to the development of productive forces. This move attests to the viability of our basic rural governance system, clarifies land ownership rights, and better protects the rights of all parties involved. It helps promote rational land use, facilitate the building of a new agricultural management system, achieve economies of scale through multiple channels, improve land and labor productivity and resource utilization, and promote modern agricultural development.

農村承包地“三權”分置改革

改革開放之初，中國農村逐步實行了家庭聯產承包責任制，將土地所有權和承包經營權分設，所有權歸集體，承包經營權歸農戶，極大地調動了億萬農民積極性，有效解決了溫飽問題，農村改革取得重大成果。當前，隨著工業化、城鎮化深入推進，農村勞動力大量進入城鎮就業，承包主體與經營主體分離，從而使承包經營權進一步分解為相對獨立的承包權和經營權。2014年9月，在中央全面深化改革領導小組第五次會議上，習近平提出要在堅持農村土地集體所有的前提下，促使承包權和經營權分離，形成所有權、承包權、經營權三權分置，經營權流轉的格局。這是繼家庭聯產承包責任制后農村改革又一重大制度創新。

“三權分置”是農村基本經營制度的自我完善，符合生產關系適應生產力發展的客觀規律，展現了農村基本經營制度的持久活力，有利于明晰土地產權關系，更好地維護農民集體、承包農戶、經營主體的權益；有利于促進土地資源合理利用，構建新型農業經營體系，發展多種形式適度規模經營，提高土地產出率、勞動生產率和資源利用率，推動現代農業發展。