China confident of food security strategy: Official

BEIJING - Domestic agricultural authorities on Friday reaffirmed China's confidence in its food security policies.

The nation's food security program involves the maintenance of agricultural productivity; limited importation; and innovation in science and technology, Agriculture Ministry spokesman Bi Meijia said.

Relying on less than 10 percent of the world's farmland, China now produces 35 percent of the world's grain and is able to feed its 1.3 billion people without importation, Bi said, calling this a major contribution to world food security.

The government's emphasis on agriculture and its supporting policies have encouraged grain production, Bi said.

The modernization of agricultural practices to increase grain output has led to irrigation innovation that ensure food production sustainability, he added.

The designation of "permanent cropland" by the central government will ensure that arable land will never shrink to less than 120 million hectares.

Grain output grew for the 11th year in a row in 2014, reaching 607 million tonnes, up 0.9 percent.

Bi said rising grain imports in recent years have been mainly driven by lower offshore prices rather than domestic grain prices, as well as the need for increasingly diversified food consumption.

China will not purchase grain massively in international market also because of the nation's food security strategy and concern about the interest of its large number of small-scale farmers, he said.