Change in Diet
The diet of an average Chinese citizen has been increasing, and obviously, this affects China’s food supply. China’s food supply is running out, and a large diet, doesn’t help the situation. Mainly because, if people eat more than what’s necessary, not everyone in China will be able to eat. So what the Chinese government should do, is reduce the portions of food given out. For example, in restaurants, the government can give them restrictions, instead of serving four rice dumplings, they could serve two. Yes, it would be very likely that the restaurants retaliate with protests. But to avoid this, the government could give them compensations.
Another solution could be advertising just like they do with the one child policy, encouraging the people to eat less. They could put posters up and remind people to eat less in newspapers and magazines. To persuade the people even further, the government could tell the people about the consequences and advantages of the sudden change in diet and eating less food; eating less helps avoid obesity, makes one healthier, eating less food is cheaper than eating more food etc. Also, the consequences would be; not being able to feed the nation, many would die of hunger. China would fall behind in development and this would affect the whole world, since China is a very important country that others depend on. Many Chinese would like this, because they are so patronizing, not doing this would make them feel guilty. Also, another thing to advertise would be to introduce new small tasteful foods that could be made at home, instead of eating out a lot in fast food restaurants.
Urbanisation
Urbanisation in general is a good thing, exposing poor rural areas to industries, improving their infrastructure, improving the school education and also the healthcare. But it can also be seen as a problem. If in all the rural areas in China were to retort to urbanisation, and abandon farming, no crops would be made, and obviously, China would starve. In the rural areas of China, the majority of its workforce is farming, if urbanisation becomes a trend, there wouldn’t be enough farmland to work on! Or even worse, farmers would stop working on the available farmland left, and go work in factories. The government has to make an effort, to make farming looking much more appealing than it is. The purpose of doing so, would be to attract other people to farming. China needs its farmers and farmland, for the crops. With the change in diet, there is a large demand for crops. The government needs to give farmers a better pay, improve their healthcare, and also subsidise, to make it cheaper for the farmers, and to help them earn more money. This would definitely attract people to farming, rather than going to factories or the CBD. With these better benefits for farmers, the chances of rural areas urbanising would reduce. This would also open jobs up to a completely different range of people, perhaps from the city too.
Moreover, introducing technology and science into farming would be more appealing too. Introducing technology to farming would make the process of farming quicker and better. So farmers would be able to lease and sell their ‘rights’ to plots and other farmers. The aim of this, is to have big farms with modern machinery.
Arable Land/Soils
Another great issue, is desertification. Arable land in northern China is turning to desert! This is a big problem, because in China, as I said before, has a budding demand for crops, and without enough farmland to grow crops on, the problem will grow larger, and prove to be harder to overcome. The reason found for the desertification, is that, the Gobi Desert is spreading. This is because:
-Herders let their animals overgraze, so vegetation gets eaten away
-Many tress have been chopped down
-Farmers have farmed their soil to intensively, and taken too much water from rivers and lakes to water their crops. So now, the rivers are drying up and it is imminent that the soil will soon after dry out and grow useless. The Chinese government developed an idea. The Green Great Wall – this is a large belt of trees and shrubs, this is being built to try and stop the spreading of Gobi Desert. The wall will be 4500km long, and is to be finished in 2075. For now, there isn’t much the government can do, but to advise the farmers to fertilize the soil they work on, to keep it arable. Furthermore, the Chinese government should rent out land in other countries, or even buy land there too, and send their farmers to work there and import the food produced.
Water Resources
China is running out of water, just like the food and arable land is. Due to flooding in some areas and even pollution of rivers and lakes. The demand for water is high, 65% of China needs it for agricultural purposes, 23% for industrial purposes and 12% for domestic purposes. But in northern China, there isn’t much water at all. This is very important, because Beijing is in the north, the capital city. As the capital city, it’s one of the largest and is the most important cities in China, and Beijing is running out of water, and is now a dry area. The Chinese government have conjured up a brilliant plan, South-to-North Diversion Project. Southern China has plenty of water, so from there water will be pumped from River Yangtze and its tributaries to feed Beijing and the dry north. The project should finish round about 2050.
Science and Technology
Everyone knows China, for its intelligence and massive breakthroughs in technology. The Chinese government could use its new technology to make machines, perform laborious tasks faster than humans usually do. This type of technology could make machines work on farmland, and perform tasks that couldn’t be done my humans. Also, they could create machines can perform the tasks, that would require more than one person to do. If technology was introduced to farmers, then that would save up a lot of time, for them. Also, it would be better for machines to do the job, because that way, the job would be done better and quicker. However the issue of money would be raised. The government can pay for the machines provided, but the farmers it would be given to, would have to work the debt off.
Agricultural Policy
The farmers of China, do not own the land they work on. So they can be kicked off the land at any time, they could be evicted from their land to have it build factories and other developments. The farmers can’t say anything because, it is owned by local officials, and they make the decisions regarding the farmland. Also, these local officials sell land for very high prices, which in favour to farmers, is partial. Many farmers in rural areas are poor, and wouldn’t be able to afford such expensive land.
Conclusion
I’ve come to the conclusion that China can feed itself. China has been developing faster than any country before, and has faced many obstacles on its rocky path. But they’ve tackled them, just as they’ll tackle this food supply problem. With their advanced technology and improved government, they’ll have the leadership to guide them through this problem. Also, the Chinese government has already come up with excellent projects and ideas to stop the factors of national hunger, which anyone could see, are flourishing.
