A relaxation in rural land use was the trailblazer for the country's reform and opening-up in the early 1980s, when a system of contacted responsibility linking remuneration to output spread among farmers. But villagers have been left far behind in the more than three decades of rapid economic growth since then.

Fundamentally transforming the land use system to their benefit has become essential if the government is to realize its goals of common prosperity and national revival.

This may explain why the communique from the Third Plenum of the 18th CPC Central Committee highlighted that villagers will be granted more access to property rights; public resources will be fairly distributed in rural and urban areas; and a unified market will be established for the use of land in both urban and rural areas.