Establishing a recycling system, limiting the thickness of mulch film, and developing new recycling machinery, Ningxia has taken a path to market-oriented recycling of residual mulch film--

Editor's note: After more than 30 years of development and application, mulch film has become the most important cultivation technology in Northwest China, playing a key role in ensuring crop yields and off-season planting, while the white pollution caused by residual mulch film is becoming more and more serious. In recent years, the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region has made efforts to explore and build a new mechanism for residual film recycling, in order to achieve farmland cleaning, resource recycling and sustainable agricultural development while reducing agricultural non-point source pollution.

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Our reporter Zhang Guofeng

In early 2014, the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region launched a special campaign to rectify agricultural film pollution. After more than two years of governance, the "three haves and three nos" rectification goal was initially achieved. The three haves: recycling outlets, processing enterprises, recycling companies or cooperative organizations; the three nos: no exposed film residues in the fields, no floating film residues in villages, roads, and forest belts, and no secondary pollution caused by random burning or landfilling. According to estimates, through the extensive implementation of mulching and recycling of residual film, crop yields generally increased by 30% to 40%, the degree of environmental pollution decreased by 60% to 70%, and farmers could earn an additional 1,000 yuan per ton of residual film, which achieved the dual effects of increasing production and income and protecting the environment.

Top-level design builds a three-dimensional network for residual film recycling

The area of mulching film covering crops in Ningxia is about 2 million mu per year, and 16,000 tons of agricultural film are used. In 2014, 1.17 million mu of residual film and 9,560.5 tons were recycled, 2,275 tons of plastic particles were processed, and the recycling rate reached 80%. In 2015, 1.8 million mu of residual film and 17,884.8 tons were recycled, 3,022.2 tons of plastic particles were processed, and the recycling rate reached 90%. "The comprehensive utilization of mulch film and pollution control is a systematic project with many influencing factors, a wide range of involvement, and a lot of capital investment. Without the promotion of government forces, such good results would not be achieved." said Yu Jinglong, director of the Ningxia Agricultural Machinery Bureau.

Ningxia has included the recycling of agricultural residual film in the government's target assessment content in accordance with the principle of "linking film covering with recycling, and taking recycling and utilization into account". Focusing on the key links of "source control, residual film recycling, residual film sales, residual film processing and utilization, and residual film harmless treatment", an indicator constraint mechanism has been established, and the three indicators of film covering area and film usage, residual film recycling area and residual film collection, and residual film sales and processing volume are mutually verified. This has become the cornerstone of the operation of Ningxia's residual film recycling mechanism and ensured the authenticity of recycling statistics.

"The construction of agricultural residual film recycling outlets is the key to recycling work." Yu Jinglong said that we will combine recycling outlets with new rural construction pilot projects and rural cleaning project construction, carry out overall planning, and reasonably layout and support the establishment of a number of waste agricultural film recycling and processing enterprises according to the use and pollution of agricultural land films, so as to drive the recycling and utilization of waste agricultural land films and waste plastic products in surrounding areas. Combined with the construction of agricultural cooperative organizations, relying on large agricultural machinery households and agricultural machinery cooperatives, we have set up agricultural film recycling service teams, carried out agricultural film recycling services, and arranged subsidies for film recycling.

To ensure that the recycling and utilization of film residues are implemented, Ningxia has implemented a "two-way" administrative and technical responsibility system in which leaders are responsible for areas and technicians are responsible for points. Each township has identified one agricultural machinery center leader and one to two technicians to be responsible for technical training, material support, film residue recycling, home guidance, follow-up services, etc., to provide farmers with technical guidance and services throughout the process.

Currently, Ningxia has built 217 film residue recycling outlets, 29 film residue processing enterprises, set up 86 machinery recycling teams, and introduced 1,260 recycling machines for research and development.

Special subsidies leverage the market-oriented operation of residual film recycling

"In the "four-in-one" film recycling and utilization system in which manual picking, mechanical picking, network recycling and enterprise processing support each other, and the government, farmers, enterprises and social organizations participate together, financial project subsidies are a lever, which is crucial to leveraging the enthusiasm of all regions and parties." said Wan Ping, deputy director of the Ningxia Agricultural Mechanization Technology Promotion Station.

In accordance with the principle of "government promotion, enterprise drive, market drive and farmer participation", Ningxia allocates 30 million yuan of special funds for the prevention and control of agricultural residual film pollution every year, which are divided and distributed to counties (districts) in central and southern China, focusing on supporting the construction of factories for the recycling and reuse of agricultural residual film, recycling subsidies, network construction, technology research and development, technology promotion, etc.; for agricultural residual film recycling and processing enterprises that have built an annual production of more than 300 tons of recycled particles, a one-time equipment investment subsidy is given through the method of first building and then subsidizing; in order to mobilize the enthusiasm of farmers to pick up and sell residual film, appropriate rewards are given for the sale of residual film raw materials.

Xiji County provides greater support to residual film processing enterprises, with a subsidy of 100,000 yuan for enterprises with a processing volume of 100 to 200 tons; a subsidy of 150,000 yuan for enterprises with a processing volume of more than 200 tons; a subsidy of 50,000 yuan for processing enterprises that introduce new equipment; and a financial subsidy of 2,000 yuan per ton of residual film processing particles. The outlets purchase agricultural residual film at 1 yuan per kilogram and sell it to processing enterprises at 1 yuan per kilogram. A transportation subsidy of 600 yuan per ton of recycled residual film is given.

"The treatment of agricultural residual film pollution ultimately depends on market means, and it is particularly important to increase the enthusiasm of farmers. First, subsidize farmers, second, subsidize recycling outlets, and third, support renewable resource recycling enterprises. We can explore preferential policies such as interest subsidies, technical transformation projects, and reduction of corporate income tax for comprehensive resource utilization." Relevant experts from the Institute of Agricultural Environment and Sustainable Development of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences said.

Mechanical innovation turns residual film recycling from a chore into a way to increase income

In the early years, residual film recycling was mainly done by manual picking, which was time-consuming and labor-intensive, and required multiple processes such as using a pickaxe to remove stubble, using a rake to rake the film and grass, collecting ridges, and clearing. It was labor-intensive and a chore. Therefore, many farmers simply let the mulch film "rot" in the field.

In order to gradually break the bottleneck of the existing residual film recycling machinery with few types and low technical level, the Ningxia Agricultural Mechanization Technology Extension Station and three agricultural machinery manufacturers in the region have made breakthrough progress in four years of research and development and developed the 1FMJQ-120 wind-powered impurity-removing residual film recycling machine. "Compared with the currently commonly used spring-tooth residual film recycling machine, this model can increase the residual film collection rate by 15% to 20% in one-time operation. The film-impurity separation effect fills the gap in China's technology and greatly reduces the labor intensity. According to comparative calculations, the mechanical recycling is 20 to 30 times more efficient than manual collection, saving 25 yuan per mu." Wan Ping said.

While promoting the application of residual film recycling machines, Ningxia has imposed mandatory restrictions on the thickness of agricultural films to facilitate mechanical operations. Agricultural films purchased by government bidding are required to use films with a thickness of 0.01 mm to 0.012 mm and good tensile strength. The production and use of films with a thickness of less than 0.01 mm and a service life of less than 6 months are prohibited. The test results in Haiyuan County show that the recovery rate of 0.01 mm thick films can reach more than 85%, while the recovery rate of 0.008 mm thick films is only 35% because they are too thin and easy to break.

Sun Shizhen, a villager in Nanyuan Village, Yuwang Town, Tongxin County, plans to buy a new residual film recycling machine. "This machine, which costs about 10,000 yuan, costs 20 yuan per mu of land. It loosens the ground and removes weeds while removing the film. This not only reduces production input, but also allows me to help other villagers collect the film, which is another way to increase income and get rich." He said expectantly.

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