ABSTRACT
The ‘three rural problems’ are: farmers’ life that has become difficult due to a decline of income and social security, obsolete agricultural production which is inept in the face of world competition, and rural areas that are underdeveloped because of an urban biased economic orientation. Among them, the inadequate increase of income and living standards is the primary concern while the restructuring and policies to bolster agriculture and to promote rural development that is socially equitable and economically sustainable are means to address that concern. After the implementation of the household land contract responsibility system, this concern about rural income is becoming a gendered concern asmore andmore of the agricultural labour force is made up of women often working isolated on their (most likely their husbands’ families’) contracted land. This system resulted in men from the countryside, moving to urban areas to seek employment and leaving women working on the land and taking the lion’s share of social reproduction but often without entitlements, resulting in the latter getting far less benefits from the overall economic growth. Increasedworld competition that came about upon China’s entry into the World Trade Organization has also contributed to a decline of income from agriculture that had started since the 1990s.1
