Chapter 61 Revaluation of the countryside

A great man once warned that if China wants to achieve economic prosperity, if there is no rural modernization, it can only be regarded as a small half of a powerful country at best. Some leaders once lamented that the transformation of the countryside is a long revolution. Now, we want to say that on the road to China's modernization at the end of this century, the countryside not only did not hold back the cities, but provided the latter with a lot of valuable experience. We want to say that the most important force that is transforming the countryside is none other than the peasants themselves.The revolution that transformed the countryside was destined not to happen anywhere else, but on that vast rural land.

In 1980, a delegation of small American rural industries inspected rural China, led by Professor D Perkins, a well-known master of development economics and director of the Institute of International Development at Harvard University.Their report was compiled into a book "Small Industry in Rural China", published by University of California Press.Since then, many Western experts have referred to the arguments and data in this report when they study China's rural industries. "The Chinese have accomplished what seems to be the most difficult task in a market economy country. They have established modernized small factories in various rural centers to provide agricultural inputs, equipment and consumer goods to consumers there." This is the professor The most important facts we have discovered in China.Since then, the small-scale industry in China's rural areas, which is what we call township industry, has become a "classic successful case" in the theoretical model of Western development economics.However, the professors have always walked on this oriental land with doubtful eyes:

"However, China's rural transport and marketing systems are poorly developed, dissociating rural society from urban centers of production. Despite the success of the small-scale industry programme, there are clearly limits to what can be expected from it. "Rural industry cannot be expected to replace modern urban industry, nor to be a generator of employment out of the countryside. "Modern small-scale industries are not so easily located in rural areas, and they themselves cannot be the driving force behind the development of smaller cities and the dispersion of cities. Although producers of consumer goods can find adequate markets in small urban centres, producers of means of production Manufacturers need to be located close to the big city manufacturers they serve.

In addition, all small producers need to be close to sources of material input supply, that is, to be close to docks or transport facilities.They need to be close to urban growth centers where entrepreneurs and skilled workers are located.In short, small factories, like large manufacturers, depend on the external economic effects of the city, except for the consumer goods market. " In the modern Western "urban center theory", such an assertion is unquestionable. However, just 17 years after Professor Perkins left China, the above comments seem to be rewritten one by one: The transportation and sales system in China's rural areas has not only been improved, but also a huge professional market circulation system has grown; the small industries in the countryside have not flocked to the cities unstoppably, on the contrary, they have established on the fields and urban industries. Closely linked industrial groups; the past one-way input urban-rural integration model has long been broken.In today's southeast coast, the countryside is no longer an appendage of the city, but is becoming a strong pole of two-way interactive integration.

Obviously, at the end of the 20th century, the value of China's rural areas urgently needs to be reassessed. In the writing of this book, we have repeatedly quoted the views of Western scholars, which is not just for embellishment.We are just trying to find a theoretical frame of reference through a lot of reading, which can correspond to the development of professional markets in Zhejiang and even China. However, we have been disappointed time and time again. In fact, the rural reforms that have taken place in our land are a form of "heresy" in the modern economic model. In addition to disappointment, what we felt was an even greater surprise.

Because what is unfolding before our eyes is a mythological drama that has never been staged. And the full meaning of the professional market can only shine brighter if it is placed in this myth, that is, in the overall pattern of social progress in rural China, and in the great changes in the fate of a generation of farmers. One day, it was a spring. In addition to the interview, we passed a private mulberry garden, and at the kind invitation of the owner, we visited it. When we were teenagers, we also had the experience of picking mulberry and raising silkworms. The surprise and care for the new life are still rippling in the depths of our sea of ​​consciousness.However, on that day, standing in such a large mulberry garden, under the sunshine of spring, amidst the silkworm white, mulberry green, and mulberry red, I could hear the silk threads of thousands of little beings eating the mulberry leaves in my ears. Silk sound, we were still deeply moved.

At that moment, we thought of Chinese farmers and professional markets from the sericulture in front of us. Farmers are like silkworms, and markets are like chrysalis. The silkworm spins silk to become a chrysalis, and gradually matures in the arms of the chrysalis. Finally, one day, the silkworm breaks out of the chrysalis, transforms into a butterfly, and flies around the world. Perhaps, this is the whole course of the great social change that is taking place in Zhejiang. In this sunny day of silkworm white, mulberry green, and mulberry red, we look forward to the moment when the chrysalis emerges.