– Paying close attention to state planning as guidance. China has formulated a series of plans, including the Outline of the Thirteenth Five-year Plan for National Economic and Social Development of the People's Republic of China, Outline of the Medium- and Long-term Plan for National Food Security (2008-2020), National Plan for an Increase of Production Capacity for 50 Billion Kg of Food (2009-2020), Outline of China's Food and Nutrition Development (2014-2020), National Agriculture Sustainable Development Plan (2015-2030), National Land Planning Outline (2016-2030), National Rural Vitalization Strategic Plan (2018-2022), and Outline of the 13th Five-year Development Plan for the Food Industry. Through these plans, China defines its goals and measures at different levels, and guides agricultural modernization, food nutrition, and the food industry, with the goal of safeguarding national food security in every respect.

– Furthering reform of the grain collection and storage system and the price formation mechanism. In order to encourage farmers to grow grain, increase their employment prospects and incomes, and protect them from low grain prices and problems in selling their output, the government has, over specified periods, on specific grain varieties in specific regions, and in accordance with specific prices, carried out procurement policies including minimum purchase price procurement and temporary state collection and storage. The purchase price was determined by the government according to the production cost and the market situation, and the grain purchased was sold at the market price. As the market changes and develops, and as the grain supply increases, the government has made different policies for different grain varieties, actively and steadily promoted reform of the grain collection and storage system and the price formation mechanism. Since 2014, we have canceled the national temporary collection and storage policy of grain and oil varieties such as soybeans, rapeseed and corn, and carried out market-based procurement in an all-round way. Since 2016, we have gradually improved the minimum purchase price policy for rice and wheat, further reduced the proportion of policy procurement, and realized market-based procurement.

– Giving full play to the important role of grain reserves. The government has a rational process for determining the functions of central and local reserves: the central grain reserves are mainly used to maintain basic needs, respond to disasters and stabilize expectations, which is the "ballast stone" of national food security. Local grain reserves are mainly used in the regional market to meet emergencies, stabilize grain prices and guarantee supply, which is the first line of defense of national food security.

5. Developing the grain industry economy

– Speeding up the transformation and upgrading of the grain industry. China upholds the principle of "grain planting to the forefront and produce to follow" and "agriculture to the forefront and industry to follow", giving full play to the role of processing enterprises as the engine, extending the grain industry chain, upgrading the value chain, and building a supply chain. We have an overall strategy to build four major carriers to raise national food security to a higher level: demonstration cities and counties, industrial parks, backbone enterprises, and the Quality Food Project, so as to raise national food security to a higher level.

– Transforming grain processing into refined and deep processing. China will increase the effective supply of special rice, special flour, special oil, functional starch sugar and protein, and promote dietary diversity among the people. We will continue to respond to the trend of rapid growth in feed demand, promote feed processing and transformation, facilitate the development of livestock and poultry breeding, and meet the nutritional needs of residents for meat, eggs and milk.

– Implementing the Quality Food Project. China has established professional post-production grain service centers to provide cleaning, drying, storage, processing and marketing services for farmers. We have established and improved a grain quality and safety inspection and monitoring system composed of 6 national-level, 32 provincial-level, 305 municipal-level and 960 county-level grain quality inspection institutions, basically realizing the full coverage of the monitoring network. We have also formulated and issued a series of standards for grain and oil to upgrade the quality of grain and oil products and increase the supply of green grain and oil.

6. Establishing a comprehensive food science and technology innovation system

– Strengthening scientific and technological support for grain production. China has promoted research into improved varieties of corn, soybeans, rice and wheat, and made concerted efforts to cultivate and popularize the best varieties. Highly efficient technology is in place for cultivation of super rice, dwarf male-sterile wheat, and hybrid corn, and tens of thousands of new combinations of high yield and high-quality crop varieties have been successfully cultivated after five or six phases of major upgrading. These have been popularized and applied over large areas, covering almost all major food crops. The per unit yield of super hybrid rice cultivated by Chinese scientist Yuan Longping has reached nearly 18.1 tons per hectare, setting a new world best. We will speed up the breeding of high-quality special rice, strong gluten and weak gluten wheat, and green and high-quality varieties such as high starch, high protein and high oil corn, and transform grain production from high yield to both high yield and high quality.

– Applying agricultural science and technology. In 2018, the contribution of scientific and technological progress to agriculture reached 58.3 percent, an increase of 42.8 percentage points from 15.5 percent in 1996. Scientific fertilization, water-saving irrigation, and green prevention and control have been popularized over large areas. That year, pesticide and chemical fertilizer utilization rates for rice, wheat and corn reached 38.8 percent and 37.8 percent, and the loss rate from diseases, pests and weeds has fallen significantly. Since 2004, China has concentrated efforts to increase crop yield through science and technology, building a total of 1,276 research fields, core areas, demonstration areas and rollout areas, with a cumulative increase of 130 million tons of grain; the per unit yield in the project areas is as much as 2.3 times the national average. The popularization and application of agricultural science and technology has played a positive role in increasing grain output.

– Upgrading the science and technology of grain storage and transportation. China has overcome a series of key technological problems in grain storage and preservation, improving pest and mildew control, loss reduction, and ensuring freshness and quality, and systematically addressed the technical problems of container transportation in bringing bulk grain from North China to the South. China continues to expand the scale of advanced storage facilities, and in 2018, the storage capacity of mechanical ventilation reached 750 million tons. Storage capacity where grains can be monitored reached 660 million tons, and storage capacity featuring circulation fumigation was 280 million tons. Scientific research findings in the fields of safe and green grain storage, quality and safety, nutrition and health, processing and transformation, modern logistics, and "intelligent grain" have been widely applied.