Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs： With the seasonal fruits on the market in summer, the fruit price has begun to fall.

　　BEIJING, July 19 (Xinhua) The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs held a press conference on the 19th to introduce the economic situation of agriculture and rural areas in the first half of the year. Wei Baigang, director of the Development Planning Department of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, said that due to the low temperature and freezing injury in the main producing areas of apples and pears last year, the prices of some fruits have increased greatly this year. Recently, with the listing of summer seasonal fruits such as watermelons, prices have begun to fall.

　　Wei Baigang introduced that in the first half of the year, in the face of complicated domestic and international situations, agricultural and rural departments at all levels made every effort to prevent and control Spodoptera exigua and African swine fever, focused on upgrading rural industries and improving rural living environment, and promoted rural reform and rural governance as a whole. The agricultural and rural economic development was generally stable, the structure was optimized, and the quality was improved, which provided important support for the national economy to continue its overall stable, steady and progressive development trend.

　　First, there was another bumper harvest of summer grain and the agricultural production situation was stable. The output of summer grain was 283.5 billion Jin, an increase of 5.86 billion Jin over the previous year, with an increase of 2.1%, which was the same as the highest output in history in 2017. At present, more than half of the early rice has been harvested, the autumn grain crops are growing normally, the spread rate of Spodoptera exigua pests on grassland is slowed down, and the foundation for the annual grain harvest is good. The epidemic situation of swine fever in Africa has been effectively controlled. Since the beginning of this year, there have been 48 cases, and the average number of cases has decreased significantly. Twenty-four provinces (regions) have lifted the blockade of epidemic areas, and the order of pig production and marketing is gradually recovering. In addition to pigs, livestock breeding and other aspects were accelerated, and the output of beef, mutton and poultry was 14.42 million tons, up 4.3% year-on-year; Milk production was 13.26 million tons, up 1.7% year-on-year; The output of aquatic products was 27.7 million tons, a year-on-year increase of 1.1%.

　　Second, the prices of agricultural products are mainly stable, and the quality and safety remain at a high level. The grain supply is sufficient and the price is stable. In June, the market price of wheat was 1.17 yuan per catty, down 2.5% year-on-year. The market price of rice was 1.4 yuan per catty, down 4.1% year-on-year; The market price of corn market was 1.02 yuan per catty, up 0.9% year-on-year. Affected by the low temperature and freezing injury in the main producing areas of apples and pears last year, the prices of some fruits have increased greatly this year. Recently, with the listing of summer seasonal fruits such as watermelons, the prices have begun to fall. Affected by the superposition of African swine fever epidemic and pig cycle, the market price of pork market in June was 25.62 yuan per kilogram, up 29.2% year-on-year. The supply of green and high-quality agricultural products has increased significantly, with more than 40,000 green, organic and geographical indication agricultural products, and the overall pass rate of routine monitoring and sampling inspection of agricultural products quality and safety has stabilized at over 97%.

　　Third, the agricultural structure continued to be optimized, and rural industries improved quality and efficiency. The quality of wheat is obviously better than last year, and the area of high-quality special wheat accounts for 33%, which is 3 percentage points higher than last year. Start the soybean revitalization plan, which is expected to increase the area by more than 10 million mu. The agricultural product processing industry continues to maintain a good momentum. It is estimated that the agricultural product processing industry above designated size will achieve an operating income of 6.8 trillion yuan in the first half of the year, up about 4% year-on-year. Leisure tourism and e-commerce of agricultural products are booming. Taking the construction of modern agricultural industrial parks as the leading factor to promote the revitalization of rural industries, 114 state-level modern agricultural industrial parks have been established throughout the country, and more than 1,000 provincial-level and a large number of city-level industrial parks have been created by demonstration. Build 552 towns with strong agricultural industries, and become a model for rural industrial integration and production-city integration.

　　Fourth, the trade in agricultural products grew steadily, and agricultural cooperation with foreign countries continued to expand. 1-mdash this year; In May, the total import and export of agricultural products was 623.96 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 10.6%. Among them, China imported 416.37 billion yuan of agricultural products, up 14.1% year-on-year, and the sources of imports changed obviously. The imports of agricultural products from Brazil, ASEAN, EU and Australia maintained rapid growth. The export of agricultural products in China was 207.59 billion yuan, up 4.1% year-on-year. The export volume of tea doubled, up 5.9% and 24.8% year-on-year, respectively. The export of superior agricultural products such as aquatic products and vegetables was generally stable, but the export to the United States dropped significantly. The export markets of agricultural products such as the European Union and ASEAN maintained a good growth momentum, with the export volume increasing by 11.3% and 4.5% respectively.

　　Fifth, the rural living environment has been continuously improved, and the green development of agriculture and rural areas has been steadily advanced. The "three clean-ups and one reform" village cleaning campaign was widely carried out throughout the country, and more than 40 million tons of various rural domestic garbage, more than 30 million tons of silt in villages, ditches and ponds, and nearly 4 million villages were cleared. The appearance of villages has been further improved. More than 80% of rural domestic garbage in administrative villages in China has been treated, and nearly 30% of farmers’ domestic sewage has been treated. In the first half of the year, more than 10 million rural toilets have been renovated. We will continue to promote the green development of agriculture, carry out pilot projects of replacing chemical fertilizers with organic fertilizers for fruit, vegetable and tea in 175 counties, and promote the resource utilization of livestock manure in 586 major animal husbandry counties.

　　Sixth, the increase of farmers’ income maintained "two highs" and rural consumption maintained rapid growth. In the first half of the year, the per capita disposable income of rural residents was 7,778 yuan, with a real increase of 6.6%, which was 0.3 percentage points higher than that of GDP and 0.9 percentage points higher than that of urban residents. The ratio of per capita disposable income of urban and rural residents was 2.74, which was 0.03 lower than that of the same period of last year. Industrial poverty alleviation has achieved remarkable results. High-quality agricultural products in poverty-stricken areas have left villages and entered cities, driving the income growth rate of poor households to continue to be higher than the national average. The rapid growth of farmers’ income effectively promoted rural consumption, and the national retail sales of rural consumer goods increased by 9.1% year-on-year, 0.8 percentage points higher than that of cities and towns; The per capita consumption expenditure of rural residents was 6,310 yuan, with a real increase of 6.4%, which was 2.3 percentage points higher than that of urban residents. The rural consumption potential was continuously released.

　　Wei Baigang said that in the first half of the year, the agricultural and rural economic situation was generally stable and stable, which played an important supporting role in ensuring supply, stabilizing prices and increasing confidence, and added confidence to effectively cope with risk challenges. However, it also faces new situations and problems such as the invasion of Spodoptera exigua, the epidemic situation of African swine fever, and the slowdown of agricultural investment growth, which need to be solved by effective measures.

　　Wei Baigang revealed that in the next step, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs will focus on the implementation of the rural revitalization strategy, take the structural reform of the agricultural supply side as the main line, focus on the hard tasks that must be completed in building a well-off society in an all-round way, do a good job in grain production, focus on stabilizing the supply of "vegetable basket" products, comprehensively push forward the improvement of rural living environment, enhance the development momentum of rural industries, accelerate the pace of rural reform, and make overall efforts to complete all the work related to agriculture, rural areas and farmers, and strive to achieve the annual goals and tasks.