There is a lot of discussion of how to consolidate Chinese farms, and many view "family farms" as the main model for the future. Chinese officials have been including this term in a lot of their strategy statements--including this year's "Number 1 Document"--but there is no definition of what a "family farm" is. Like many things in China, confusion abounds since there are conceptual and legal ambiguities regarding the "family farm." The concept in China is similar to the American concept but has to be understood in context of China's existing system. Moreover, a commercially-oriented "family farm" business is in a legal gray area since it does not fit into China's communist administrative structure that has separate lines of authority for peasants and industrial enterprises. The usual Chinese word for "farm" is nonghu (农户) but this actually means "rural household." "Nong" (农) can mean either...
Retired USDA economist Fred Gale peers through the "dim sums" of puzzling data to provide insight about China's agricultural markets in bite-size pieces like Chinese "dim sum" snacks. See the Archive and Labels for posts on various topics going back to 2008.