China's top legislator Wu Bangguo Friday warned law enforcement agencies against the possible rebound of illegal appropriation of farmland.

He said the recent iron-fisted clear-up in the land market had yielded preliminary results, but local authorities were still displaying a strong lust for diverting cultivated land to industrial development.

Wu made the remarks at the closing ceremony of the 10th session of the 10th National People's Congress (NPC) held from June 21 to Friday.

He recalled that in 1998, China amended its Land Management Law in order to safeguard shrinking crop land, and set up a strict farmland protection system.

However, unlawful appropriation of farmland has again reared its head and even became rampant in the past few years, said Wu.

The country's grain acreage dropped under 100 million hectares last year, the lowest since 1949.

As a result, grain possession per capita was only 333.5 kilograms in 2003, hitting the bottom line for the past 22 years, according to the Ministry of Agriculture.

"We must keep a sober mind in dealing with the relations between industrial development and land protection. All departments concerned should strengthen efforts in clearing up illegal land requisition according to law," said Wu.

The top legislator also stressed the importance of keeping up policy support in grain planting.

"Farmers raised both hands to the current favorable policies. But they also worry that these incentives come with the grain decline and may go if the output resumed," said Wu.

Major agriculture policies include lowering the agriculture tax, giving subsidies to grain growers directly and setting minimum purchasing prices for staple grain products.

He said the NPC Standing Committee would fix effective policies in the form of law and strengthen supervision on law enforcement.

The top legislature yesterday passed a law to promote agricultural mechanization.

The eight-chapter law, which will take effect on November 1, includes 34 articles, mainly on agricultural machine development and research, quality control and expansion of usage of advanced machines, preferential financial policies, and related social service for agricultural mechanization.

Now the average mechanization rate in farming and harvesting is only about 30 percent in China, while the rate is 70 percent in developed countries.

Besides the issue of agriculture, a list of financial malpractices in the central budget implementation of 2003 also attracted great attention from NPC members.

Auditor-General Li Jinhua delivered a report to the NPC Standing Committee on Wednesday, in which he said that 1.4 billion yuan (US$170 million) was misused out of the 2003 budget by 41 central ministries and commissions under the State Council.

Many NPC members said they were startled at the malpractice, especially the embezzlement of special funds for education, poverty alleviation or disaster relief.

The lawmakers said the State Council, the NPC and the National Audit Office should follow up and supervise moves to overcome the malpractice.

Li Mingyu, one of the NPC deputies, said that setting up a management mechanism on the use of special funds was an urgent matter.

(China Daily June 26, 2004)