Our Proposal to Help Farmers Sell Real Value
Last week, Foodthink’s coverage of the proposed revisions to the Measures for the Quality and Safety Supervision and Administration of Market Sales of Edible Agricultural Products drew considerable attention from our readers. By removing the term “drying” from the definition of “edible agricultural products,” the revision strongly suggests that farmers who produce and sell their own dried vegetables, fruits, or fish could soon face legal penalties.
Ahead of the 4 June deadline for public consultation, Foodthink joined forces with concerned readers, farmers, experts, businesses, media outlets, and civil society organisations to formally submit a joint recommendation. We believe it is crucial to legally safeguard the right of smallholder farmers to produce and sell dried goods without requiring a food production licence. We strongly urge the State Administration for Market Regulation to retain “drying” in the revised definition.
Over the past week, through discussions with numerous farmers, consumers, and experts, we have come to realise that, regardless of the outcome of this consultation, the gradual erosion of smallholders’ production rights has been an undercurrent of China’s rural and agricultural transformation over the past forty years. It poses a hidden threat to the realisation of rural revitalisation efforts, and the current focus on dried products is merely the tip of the iceberg.
Therefore, submitting our recommendations is not the end of the road.
First and foremost, we hope the public and relevant authorities will gain a deeper understanding of the challenges farmers face. Building discussion on this foundation will help foster a consensus among consumers, regulators, and legislators on the need to protect farmers’ rights.
In last Thursday’s article, we also gathered a range of views from farming communities. Recently, mainstream outlets such as The Beijing News and Jiemian have published pieces examining the potential impact of these revisions on farmers. The growing public interest demonstrates that our advocacy is yielding results. In the coming weeks, we will also address and respond to some of the key perspectives raised.
Secondly, we recognise that drying is merely one facet of a broader issue. In reality, almost all primary processing of agricultural products carried out by farmers exists in a legal grey area if they lack a food production licence. In practice, whether a processed product is deemed lawful hinges entirely on the interpretation of local market regulation authorities (formerly food and drug administration bodies), or even the legal technicalities exploited by professional counterfeit-fighters. A product might be legally produced and sold in one region, yet incur heavy fines in another. If dried chillies are deemed unmarketable today, what about chilli powder, dried longans, goji berries, or Sichuan peppercorns? Should the regulatory revisions follow their current trajectory, the room for farmers to operate will steadily narrow. This mirrors a trend many smallholders and sales platforms have already felt over the past few years.
While it is not impossible for individual farmers to navigate enforcement agencies alone to defend their interests, for many, facing regulatory pressure and wading through volumes of legal text in isolation is an overwhelmingly daunting, if not impossible, task.
- What legal and policy restrictions have you encountered when carrying out basic processing and sales of farm produce?
- How much time, effort, and expense have you incurred (or anticipate incurring) to comply with relevant laws and regulations?
- Which sales channels are currently open to your processed products? Have you faced any obstacles in selling them?
- In your view, which of the requirements set by market regulators are reasonable, and which are unnecessary?
- How do you believe regulators could adjust both legislation and enforcement to better align with the realities farmers face?
Writing as consumers, farmers, retailers, agricultural cooperatives, and public interest organisations committed to agricultural development and the welfare of farming communities, we wish to express our concerns and submit recommendations regarding the recent revision to the *Measures for the Supervision and Administration of the Quality and Safety of the Market Sale of Edible Agricultural Products (Draft for Comments)*. Specifically, we are concerned by the proposal to remove “drying” from the definition of edible agricultural products.
We note that the draft document removes “drying” as a processing method from the definition of “edible agricultural products”. Consequently, dried agricultural produce would no longer be classified as such. Under Article 35 of the *Food Safety Law*, this would mean that all production of dried goods must henceforth obtain a relevant food production licence.
In practice, because the *Classification Catalogue for Food Production Licences* already categorises dried vegetables, fruits, and aquatic products, enforcement authorities have frequently treated the sale of self-dried produce by smallholders lacking a production licence as illegal. Such cases have routinely been penalised under Article 122 of the *Food Safety Law*.
Should “drying” be formally excised from the definition of edible agricultural products, the final legal avenue for producers to defend the sale of their self-dried goods will also vanish.
China’s agricultural reality is characterised by a vast nation composed predominantly of smallholder farms. Beyond licensed producers, the production of dried goods is carried out by a vast number of ordinary farming households, family farms, and agricultural cooperatives. Many of these operators simply lack the scale or financial resources to apply for a food production licence. This proposed change would directly impact countless agricultural producers, particularly smallholders who rely on dried produce as their primary livelihood, effectively barring them from this essential processing stage.
We believe it is essential to legally guarantee smallholders the right to produce and sell dried goods without holding a food production licence. Our rationale is as follows:
First, dried agricultural produce forms a vital component of smallholders’ livelihoods. Prohibiting their sale would render many farming households economically unsustainable. As is widely understood, manufacturing processed foods requires a food production licence—a standard that remains out of reach for many small-scale farmers. Even the alternative of obtaining a small workshop registration demands considerable time and resources. For smallholders already grappling with operational pressures, this would undoubtedly compound their difficulties. Today, there are 210 million smallholder farming households across China. From the dried fruits of the northwest to the coastal dried seafood, the mountain-grown tea and traditional herbs, and the dried chillies and Sichuan peppercorns of the southwest, smallholders who depend on dried produce for their livelihoods are found in every region.
This is particularly true for smallholders processing their own harvest. Rather than purchasing raw materials from external suppliers, they simply sun-dry or mechanically dry their own produce. The resulting dried goods carry a higher value-added, bypass the costs associated with centralised factory processing, and significantly boost household income. Take crops such as red dates, goji berries, walnuts, and certain edible fungi: they are virtually unsellable in fresh form and only gain culinary and commercial value once dried. The vast majority of farming households dry these products themselves before sale. Stripping “drying” from the edible agricultural product standard would impose severe financial strain on these smallholders, potentially threatening their very livelihoods.
Furthermore, smallholders drying their own agricultural produce does not alter the fundamental nature of the food, nor does it introduce additional food safety risks. The vast majority of this drying occurs through natural means. These products retain distinct flavour profiles and rich nutritional value. While isolated incidents have occurred—such as sulphur-treated goji berries or dried fish laced with preservatives—these reflect the actions of individual operators, and in some cases, even large-scale, licensed producers. Prohibiting small-scale production merely places undue pressure on farming households without eliminating safety hazards. Moreover, forcibly classifying these items as processed foods would fail to accurately reflect their true nature.
More importantly, a blanket prohibition on dried goods produced by smallholders is entirely impractical within the current market circulation and regulatory framework. The majority of self-dried produce is traded through traditional channels such as local markets and direct-to-consumer networks, characterised by diverse sourcing, multiple distribution tiers, and inherent difficulties in traceability. Removing “drying” from the edible agricultural product definition is unlikely to eradicate the sale of smallholder produce in these venues. Instead, it would place an overwhelming burden on local enforcement officers. Worse still, it would provide “professional claimants” with a legal pretext to weaponise regulations against smallholders, thereby disrupting market order and draining already scarce enforcement resources.
Therefore, we strongly urge the State Administration for Market Regulation to retain “drying” within the definition of edible agricultural products. Doing so will safeguard the interests of smallholder farmers, support rural revitalisation, and foster the sustainable development of agriculture.
We further maintain that relevant legislation should offer broader protection for smallholders’ rights to process agricultural produce, extending beyond just dried goods. To revoke or restrict these processing rights not only runs counter to China’s foundational principle of collaborative social governance in food safety, but also conflicts with established international consensus on supporting smallholder production and development.
First, the fundamental logic of China’s collaborative food safety governance rests on the deep involvement of smallholder farmers in food safety oversight. Removing or restricting smallholders’ rights to process edible agricultural products would undermine their sense of responsibility in safeguarding food safety, while increasing the costs of administrative governance and frontline enforcement. The ever-improving food safety supply chain cannot mask the reality that smallholders are excluded from core decision-making in market transactions. Yet within the Chinese context, the significant responsibility smallholders bear for national food safety is disproportionately weighted against their vulnerable development rights and economic standing. They are frequently reduced to mere providers of basic inputs at the tail end of supply chains, or relegated to the sidelines of value distribution. Behind the adulteration and fraud in edible agricultural products seen in certain provinces lies precisely this lack of sufficient development rights for smallholders across production, processing, and marketing.
Second, amid the global transformation of food systems, safeguarding the right to lead and participate in the processing of edible agricultural products has emerged as a shared policy objective across food security, safety, and nutrition. This goal continues to be refined and updated in UN-level reports. For instance, in the 2022 The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World report, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization formally integrated ‘Agency’ as a new dimension into the concept of food security. In this framework, food security encompasses not only the availability of grains, the safety of food, and nutritional adequacy, but also the security of rights. Consequently, agency underscores the capacity of farming households to decide what they eat and produce, as well as their right to determine how they grow, process, and sell food within the system, and to take part in shaping food policy and governance processes.
Therefore, enabling smallholders to lead and engage in the processing of edible agricultural products, particularly the deep processing of local specialities, is a fundamental requirement to safeguard their agency and autonomy across the entire industry chain. It maximises the enhancement of their development rights and encourages them to voluntarily shoulder food safety responsibilities. Furthermore, this requirement aligns closely with the broader food vision’s emphasis on “developing food resources comprehensively and through diverse channels to cultivate a rich variety of food products.” This, in turn, harnesses the diversity of smallholder farming as a key driver for implementing principles such as “cultivating grains, cash crops, livestock, fisheries, or forestry according to local suitability,” and for “drawing food from forests, from rivers, lakes, and seas, and from controlled-environment agriculture.” Ultimately, this can genuinely deliver on the promise of “enabling farmers to reap profits and greater returns.” Only through such enhanced profitability can genuine collaborative food safety governance take root, administrative and frontline enforcement costs be reduced, and the ultimate goal of strengthening food safety at its source be achieved.
In light of this, we also urge market regulation authorities to adopt the following measures when formulating relevant laws, regulations, and policies affecting farmers:
(1) Proactively disclose the basis for revisions
The State Administration for Market Regulation’s current public statement on the revision of the Measures for the Supervision and Administration of Quality and Safety of Edible Agricultural Products in Market Sales already provides detailed explanations for the vast majority of amendments. However, it omits any justification for the revised definition of edible agricultural products. Our review of the statement also indicates that the Administration gathered extensive feedback for this revision, including voices from grassroots levels.
Given the direct impact on numerous smallholders, we recommend that the relevant authorities voluntarily publish the research data and stakeholder feedback underpinning this amendment, particularly findings drawn from small-scale producers. We will also seek access to this information through formal government disclosure channels in due course.
(2) Clarify the scope of “edible agricultural products” and preserve space for smallholder-produced processed goods
Regardless of whether the provisions regarding “drying” are ultimately amended, we hope the State Administration for Market Regulation will subsequently issue guidance documents that more clearly delineate the applicable scope of “edible agricultural products.” Such guidance should direct frontline enforcement to apply differentiated management measures to different categories of processed goods, thereby protecting farmers’ rights to independently produce certain simply processed products.
(3) Establish a long-term mechanism to enable differentiated management
In the long term, we recommend adopting differentiated regulatory approaches for producers of different scales. Even among producers of the same product, small-scale operators processing their own agricultural output should be treated differently from large food enterprises engaged in contract processing. This aligns with internationally established regulatory practices.
For instance, minimally processed agricultural produce could be classified separately from both edible agricultural goods and finished foodstuffs, enabling distinct regulatory oversight and a modest reduction in entry barriers for producers. In terms of product categories, priority should be given to those traditionally processed by producers themselves and carrying a lower safety risk. When determining producer eligibility, authorities should look beyond the manufacturing process of the final product to also consider the nature of the operator and the source of the raw materials.
It may also be worth optimising existing local regulations for small-scale food processing workshops by introducing registration or filing systems alongside mandatory licensing. This would safeguard farmers’ legitimate interests while easing regulatory burdens.
We hope the State Administration for Market Regulation will give serious consideration to public concerns, fully consult with stakeholders, and develop more scientific and rational management measures. These should ensure food safety without placing excessive burdens on smallholder farmers, while encouraging and supporting them to improve their production standards and supply consumers with safer, healthier agricultural products.
We once again thank the State Administration for Market Regulation for its attention to our recommendations and look forward to further substantive and direct dialogue.
Editor: Foodthink