Analysis on the Present Situation of China's Agricultural Development and the Sustainable Development of the Agricultural Economy

Introduction

Sustainable agricultural development is crucial for enhancing productivity as well as availability of food and at the same time reviving soil/land fertility, efficient management of resources, strengthening rural livelihood, ensuring participation of all stakeholders leaving no one behind in this transitional phase towards creating food security for all and mitigating impact of climate change on agriculture. Agriculture plays an important role in growth of any economy and since the onset of pandemic in 2020, China determines to rebound by building prosperous society through development of its agricultural economy. China, with large agricultural area being underdeveloped, can only ensure sustainable development for the future by focusing on, the development of agriculture sector thereby serving as an important springboard for the economic take-off as well as providing an effective solution to help the country successfully end poverty (Wang et al., 2008).

History is a testament to the fact that, since 1978, China has gradually focused and developed market-oriented rural reforms. This practice of breaking through the shackles of the traditional system has been a turning point in the historical development of China's agriculture, and a big leap towards the road to sustainable development of China's agriculture economy (Wang, 2004). The successful implementation of economic reforms implemented in China towards market-oriented economy has enabled China to feed nearly 21% of the world's population with less than 9% of the world's arable land (Chen & Pan, 2005). Reforms focusing on agriculture, rural areas and farmers in China have also led to the comprehensive development of the reform of China's economic system and contributed further to the growth of China's economy. Opening doors to foreign trade and foreign investment have also contributed significantly in prosperity of China as a nation and its people.

However, if China's economy wants to continue to develop steadily, the pace of adopting practices related to sustainable development of agriculture and agricultural products needs to increase rapidly. Climate change continues to impact the environment in significant number of ways and the same has been posing a great challenge to the development of agriculture and agricultural products. Increase in global temperatures and precipitation variability, prolonged drought and water shortages, loss of agricultural biodiversity coupled with energy depletion, is taking a great toll on development of China's agriculture and agricultural products. Since these problems have emerged through human interference, it is all the more crucial that human beings themselves find solutions to these pressing issues. Appropriately utilizing renewable energy resources and fixing gaps between proportion of products and services contributing to China's agricultural imports and exports will be key factor for consideration to overcome this dilemma. (Zhang, 2014).

At this point in time when entire humanity is at a crucial crossroads on account of COVID-19, the path of sustainable development of China's agriculture and agricultural products can pave the way for the whole world to break through this impasse. This path is definitely most effective providing a room for great opportunities but also great challenges at the same time. The second section aims to elaborate the impact of deteriorating ecological environment on China's agricultural production and agricultural economy. The author in this section has attempted to analyse the impact of climate and environment on China's agricultural land economy.

The third section attempts to discuss the sustainable utilization of agricultural resources in China. The author investigates the sustainable use of water and soil resources in China as compared to the use of these ecological resources in past few years. The fourth section analyzes the feasibility and sustainable development of agriculture in China. In this section, the author discusses the present situation of the development of sustainable agricultural economy in China from the perspective of theory and development practice. The author also investigates the development of digital and intelligent agriculture in science and technology in the world and in China. On the basis of this study, the author has attempted to evaluate the possibility of sustainable development of agriculture in China.