This year, the Ministry of Agriculture proposed the "Five Major Actions for Green Agricultural Development", one of which is the agricultural film recycling action focusing on the northwest. It is required to focus on cotton, corn and potatoes as key crops, with thickened mulch film application, mechanized picking, professional recycling and resource utilization as the main attack direction. 100 governance demonstration counties will be built in Gansu, Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia and other regions, and contiguous implementation, county-wide promotion and comprehensive governance

During the autumn harvest season, in Shuncheng Company Village, Tunken Team Town, Shangdu County, Inner Mongolia, farmer Li Gaoliang was fiddling with the farmland residual film recycling machine introduced from Dingxi, Gansu. "I grow mulch-covered potatoes. It takes half a day for one person to pick up residual film manually, but it will be much faster if a machine is used. This equipment in Dingxi is said to be able to recycle more than 40 acres of land a day. We tried it for a few days. Although the effect is not as good as in Gansu, it can still solve the big problem. The difficulty is that the mulch film is thin and easy to break." With the increasing use of mulch film and the number of years of use, the pollution caused by residual film is also accumulating.

Don't let mulch become a "demon on the ground"

Agricultural film is the fourth largest agricultural production material after seeds, pesticides and fertilizers. Due to long-term emphasis on use and neglect of recycling, the current recycling rate of agricultural film in China is less than two-thirds, and the residual pollution of mulch film in some areas is serious

"The main component of mulch film is polyethylene, which takes hundreds of years to completely decompose naturally in farmland, which has a certain impact on the environment and will cause damage such as soil compaction and low emergence rate. However, mulch film covering is an indispensable key technology in the vast dry farming areas in the north." Meng De, director of the Inner Mongolia Agricultural Technology Extension Station, told reporters that there are 137 million mu of arable land in the region, but water resources are seriously scarce, and the average water volume per mu of arable land is less than a quarter of the average level in China; the frost-free period is only 100 to 130 days, and the heat is low. The mulch film covering technology has the characteristics of heat preservation, moisture increase, drought resistance and water saving. "It can be said that without plastic film, Inner Mongolia would not be able to contribute 25 billion jin of commercial grain to the country every year."

Statistical data from the Agricultural Survey Team of the Statistics Bureau of the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region in 2015 showed that the area covered by plastic film in the region was 17.72 million mu, and the amount of plastic film used was 69,669 tons. The soil of the film-covered farmland had plastic film residues to varying degrees. The average amount of plastic film residue per mu of farmland that had been covered with plastic film for more than five years was 3.12 kg, and the residue in some areas was as high as 18 kg per mu.

Agricultural film is the fourth largest agricultural production material after seeds, pesticides and fertilizers. China's total annual consumption of agricultural film reached more than 2.6 million tons, of which 1.45 million tons were plastic film. The plastic film covering technology "filled the rice bag and enriched the vegetable basket", making an important contribution to national food security. However, due to the long-term emphasis on use and neglect of recycling, the current recycling rate of agricultural film in China is less than two-thirds, and the residual pollution of plastic film in some areas is serious. Residual plastic film is abandoned in the fields and blown by the wind to the front and back of houses and the treetops in the fields, affecting the appearance of the village.

Yan Changrong, a researcher at the Institute of Agricultural Environment and Sustainable Development of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, said that in recent years, there have been varying degrees of residual plastic film in the soil of film-covered farmland, and the average amount of residual plastic film per mu in some areas has reached 4 to 20 kilograms. Residual plastic film destroys the soil structure, affects crop emergence, hinders root growth, and leads to reduced crop yields. Residual plastic film reduces sowing quality, prevents crop root growth, and affects water and nutrient absorption. Promoting the recycling of agricultural film is conducive to improving product quality and agricultural production efficiency; producing recycled plastic products is conducive to resource conservation and improving the rural living environment.

Thick film recycling has become an industrial chain

The recycling and utilization of plastic film in Huining County has formed an industrial chain. Local farmers have generally used high-standard mulch films. In fact, the cost per mu is about 70 yuan, and the recycling of old mulch films can get about 11 yuan in compensation. In addition, the mulch film can increase grain production, and the average income of each household can reach 200 to 300 yuan.

The reporter learned that the long-term and large-scale use of ultra-thin mulch films is the most important reason for the residual mulch films. Generally speaking, the residual film has recycling value only when the impurity rate is less than 50%, so thick film must be used, otherwise the mechanized recycling and factory processing of the residual film will be difficult to achieve. The mulch film is sold by weight. Under the same coverage area, the thinner the mulch film, the lower the per mu use cost, which makes the mulch film with a thickness of less than 0.008 mm popular in many places. Because ultra-thin mulch films are fragile, it is very difficult to pick them up manually. At the same time, the machines on the market are difficult to meet the demand for residual film recycling, and the residual agricultural film is increasing.

"Under the current economic and technological conditions, traditional agricultural mulch films will be irreplaceable agricultural materials for a long time. This requires that the prevention and control of waste mulch film residues must adhere to the path of improving mulch film quality standards, increasing recycling rates and resource utilization. At present, Gansu Province has invested a total of 369 million yuan in central and provincial fiscal funds. In 2016, the province's waste agricultural film recycling rate reached 78.6%. Practice has proved that the recycling of waste mulch films is not difficult. The key is to achieve sustainable development." Yang Qifeng, deputy director of the Gansu Provincial Department of Agriculture, said.

During the autumn harvest season, at Dewei Plastic Industry Co., Ltd. in Huining County, Gansu Province, there was an endless stream of vehicles delivering waste mulch films to the factory. Chen Delin, general manager of the company, said that the recycled particles processed from waste mulch films have always been in good sales. With the support of the government, the scale of the enterprise has gradually expanded, and the purchase volume of waste mulch films has also increased. According to reports, there are two main ways to use waste agricultural film: one is to crush and clean the agricultural film, and then produce recycled plastic particles through heat melting and extrusion, and then further process them into polyethylene pipes, plastic containers, drip irrigation belts, etc.; the other is to directly crush the agricultural film, mix it with a certain proportion of slag, and process it into recycled products such as manhole rings and manhole covers.

The recycling of plastic film in Huining County has formed an industrial chain. There are 2 large-scale processing enterprises, 8 primary processing enterprises, 28 rural recycling points, and more than 50 mobile vendors engaged in the purchase of waste plastic film all year round. Recycling companies openly purchase at reasonable prices, which has stimulated the enthusiasm of farmers to pick up and sell. Local farmers have generally used 0.01 mm high-standard mulch films, with an average investment of 7.5 kg per mu. The state and provincial governments subsidize 2 kg, and the remaining 5.5 kg of mulch films are raised by farmers themselves. In fact, the investment cost per mu for farmers is about 70 yuan, and the recycling of old films can get a compensation of about 11 yuan. In addition, the mulch film can increase grain production, and the average income of each household can reach 200 to 300 yuan. Picking up and selling waste mulch films has become a market behavior.

The comprehensive utilization of mulch films and pollution control is a systematic project. In 2013, the Gansu Provincial Government issued a normative document to completely eliminate ultra-thin mulch films that are difficult to recycle throughout the province. In January 2014, China's first local regulation on the recycling of waste agricultural films, the "Gansu Province Waste Agricultural Film Recycling Regulations", was implemented. In May 2016, Xinjiang officially implemented the "Agricultural Land Film Management Regulations", and the regulations of the two provinces and regions raised the management experience of many years to the level of regulations. In 2017, the Ministry of Agriculture built 100 demonstration counties for mulch film management in Gansu, Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia, promoted the use of thickened mulch films, and basically established a recycling and processing system. The mulch film recycling rate in the demonstration counties reached more than 80% in the season, and the basic resource utilization of mulch films was realized first.

A series of problems remain to be solved

Mulch film recycling and management faces the problems of lack of standards, lack of policies, and difficulty in mechanical recycling. On the one hand, China should accelerate the introduction and testing of new products such as degradable mulch films, and promote the demonstration and promotion of new mulch film products from experimental research; on the other hand, subsidies should be given to manufacturers or farmers at the production or sales end to increase the enthusiasm for promoting the use of degradable mulch films

Liao Xiyuan, director of the Science and Education Department of the Ministry of Agriculture, said that mulch film recycling and management has started and achieved certain results, but it still faces many difficulties. One is the lack of standards. Although Xinjiang, Gansu and other places have issued local standards and used relevant regulations to promote the implementation of standards, the mulch film standards currently implemented at the national level are still loose, and ultra-thin mulch films are still in large quantities. The second is the lack of policies. Due to the lack of preferential policies, coupled with the impact of the continuous decline in the price of recycled plastic products and the rising cost of manual picking, recycling and processing companies have no profit margin and are unable to continue. Third, mechanical recycling is difficult. At present, most areas of mulch film recycling is mainly based on manual picking, and the mechanical recycling technology of mulch film is still immature. It has not solved the problems of low recycling rate and separation from straw and soil. The recycling operation cost is high and the efficiency is low.

Industry experts believe that the recycling of waste mulch film is a low-profit industry, and preferential policies to support the recycling and processing enterprises of waste mulch film should be studied and formulated as soon as possible, such as expanding the tax preferential policies for resource reuse, and giving preferential treatment in water, land, electricity and credit, etc., gradually improving the recycling and processing network of waste mulch film, supporting the construction of a number of waste mulch film processing and acquisition outlets, encouraging mulch film production enterprises to recycle waste mulch film, promoting the pilot policies of "whoever sells, whoever manages" and "old mulch for new mulch", and encouraging farmers and agricultural machinery service organizations to recycle old mulch film.

This year, the Ministry of Agriculture selected four counties in Gansu and Xinjiang to explore the establishment of a pilot program for the extended producer responsibility system of "whoever produces, recycles" for mulch films. The mulch film production enterprises will be responsible for unified supply, unified laying and unified recycling of mulch films. The responsibility for recycling mulch films will be transferred from users to producers, and farmers will switch from buying products to buying services, so as to promote mulch film production enterprises to recycle waste mulch films. At the same time, 100 large counties that use mulch films were selected in Gansu, Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia to adjust the use of funds for related projects, change the use of subsidies to recycling subsidies, and promote the establishment of a recycling mechanism with multiple methods such as business entities handing in, professional organizations recycling, and processing enterprises recycling.

Increasing scientific research and promoting the use of degradable mulch films is also a major direction for the industry. At present, relevant departments have established the National Agricultural Waste Recycling Innovation Alliance and the Key Laboratory for the Prevention and Control of Agricultural Film Pollution. Using the method of cooperation among agriculture, enterprises and science, 6 scientific research units and 24 major Chinese biodegradable material production enterprises were organized to carry out degradable mulch film trials and demonstrations. Lanzhou Jintudi Plastic Products Co., Ltd. has successfully developed and produced high-strength environmentally friendly mulch films that are close to the EU agricultural covering material standards, which fully meet the requirements of mechanized mulching operations and mechanical film recycling.

It is understood that the cost of degradable mulch films is higher than that of ordinary mulch films, and the average cost per mu for farmers has increased by about 100 yuan, which has limited the promotion and application. This is the main reason why degradable mulch films are not easy to promote on a large scale. At the same time, the degradation process of degradable mulch films is greatly affected by the environment, and it is difficult to meet the different needs of different crop growth cycles. Experts suggest that on the one hand, it is necessary to speed up the introduction and testing of new products such as degradable mulch films, and promote the transformation of new mulch film products from experimental research to demonstration and promotion; on the other hand, subsidies should be given to manufacturers or farmers at the production or sales end to increase the enthusiasm for promoting the use of degradable mulch films.

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