What Does an Agricultural Economist Do?

Mr. Zhang Xinyi is a respected older scientist and an outstanding agricultural economist. He was born in January 17, 1897, in Fuhe Village, Yongjing County, Gansu Province. He graduated from Beijing Tsinghua School in 1922 and graduated from the Department of Animal Husbandry of Iowa Agricultural College in the United States in 1925. In 1926, he obtained a master's degree in agricultural economics from Cornell University. Former professor and director of the Department of Agricultural Extension of Jinling University, director of the Bank of China Rural Loan, and director of the Construction Department of Gansu Province. After liberation, he served as the director of the Agricultural Planning Division of the Planning Bureau of the Central Financial and Economic Commission, the deputy director of the Land Utilization Bureau of the Ministry of Agriculture, the full-time vice chairman of the Chinese Agricultural Society, and the third consultant, the honorary chairman of the Chinese Soil and Water Conservation Society, and the honorary chairman of the Chinese Land Society. In 1990, he was honored as a lifetime member by the International Association of Agricultural Economics. He died in Beijing on March 23, 1992. ^[1]

Zhang Xinyi

(Scientist, Agricultural Economist)

Mr. Zhang Xinyi is a respected older generation

1. Zhang Xinyi. Estimates of China's population.

2. Zhang Xinyi. Preparing trials of Chinese agricultural production forecasts. Legislative Statistics Monthly Report, 1930, 2 (5).

3. Zhang Xinyi. A little bit of material on China's agricultural problems. Legislative Statistics Monthly Report, 1930, 2 (6).

4. Zhang Xinyi. Twenty-four songs in the new calendar.

5. Zhang Xinyi. Study on the season of wheat planting in China. Legislative Statistics Monthly Report, 1930, 2 (8).

6, Zhang Xinyi. China's Food Problems. Shanghai: China Institute of Pacific Relations, 1931 (Originally in English).

7, Zhang Xinyi. Discussion on the statistical methods of cotton production in China. Legislative Council Monthly Statistics, 1931, 3 (2),

8. Zhang Xinyi. Estimates of China's agricultural profile. Nanjing: Department of Agricultural Economics, Jinling University, 1933.

9, Zhang Xin waited. A trial survey of the population and agriculture of Jurong County was held. Nanjing: National Defense Design Committee, 1934.

10. Zhang Xinyi. Six years of Gansu production and construction. Gansu Daily, December 31, 1946.

11. Zhang Xinyi. Maintaining soil and water development for agricultural production. Beijing: Zhonghua Book Company, 1953.

12, Zhang Xin first class. Problems of Rational Land Use in the Northwest Loess Plateau. Science Bulletin, 1954 (6).

13. Zhang Xinyi. Further develop green manure production in southern China. Red Flag, 1962.

14. Zhang Xinyi. How to accelerate the development of agricultural production in semi-arid loess areas. Report at the National Symposium on Soil and Water Conservation Farming, 1983.

15. Zhang Xinyi. Speed up the transformation and construction of loess hilly areas with farming measures that store water and soil. Soil and Water Conservation, 1985 (6). ^[2]

The founder of agricultural statistics in China

Zhang Xinyi (middle) in the woodland in 1985

Zhang Xinyi (1897-1992), an agricultural economist, an expert on land use and soil and water conservation, and a founder of agricultural statistics in China. He presided over the construction of China's first earth dam reservoir and the establishment of the first soil and water conservation station, advocating soil and water conservation and the rational and sustainable use of land on the Northwest Loess Plateau, introducing fine crops such as sedgewood, white melons, and acacia, and training talent All have outstanding contributions.

Zhang Xinyi, formerly known as Zhang Jizhong (always abbreviated as CCChang), was born on January 17, 1897 in Fuhe Village, Yongjing County, Gansu Province. When he was a teenager, his family was poor. At the age of 7, he enlightened. He studied private education for 3 years. At the age of 10, he helped his mother to farm at home. At the age of 13, he went to Lanzhou Teachers' Primary School. Progressive youth in church avoidance learn English.

In 1914, he was admitted to Lanzhou Middle School. When he was in the first grade, he was in Beijing for Tsinghua School (a preparatory school for studying in the United States with Gengzi compensation at the time, and now Tsinghua University). With the advantage of studying English for several months, Zhang Xinyi was selected, and came to Beijing on foot after a arduous journey of more than a month. During the re-examination, I was unable to accept because I failed English and exceeded the required age for enrollment. I later argued that I came to Beijing on foot and moved the examiner. I was allowed to try for half a year before speaking. After passing the English quiz half a year later, he became a formal student.

In the eight years of Tsinghua School (1914-1922), in addition to completing various assignments and laying a good foundation in English, in order to explore the purpose and way of life, he also studied the Chinese schools of thought and Buddhism, Christianity theory, ethics and morality. Accepted Wang Yangming's doctrine of knowledge and national reconciliation. This has almost become his basic rule for life since then.

When the May Fourth Movement broke out, he was deeply aware of the corruption of the Beiyang government, participated in the movement with his classmates, and was detained by the reactionary military police for more than 10 days. In the future, he will actively participate in various social activities and take the responsibility of innovating current affairs. He and Gao Shiqi (later became famous science writers) and other compulsory teaching classes in "School Evening School", and also served as principal for one year to help literacy. He and Liang Shiqiu, Pan Guangdan and other four people formed a "thick and thin society"-meaning that they were "not thick in nature and thin in cheeks". They were not good people, and when they met others with unreasonable words and deeds, they immediately criticized and opposed false hypotheses. In 1921, the school's student union organized a "student court". He served as the first prosecutor and presided over justice.

When he was at Tsinghua Academy, he developed a habit of physical exercise and persisted until his twilight years. The hard work that started as a teenager allowed him to fight tuberculosis, typhoid fever, and three gastrointestinal cancer operations after the age of 80, and lived to the age of 95. ^[3]

Determined to study agriculture, organized "New Farmers Association"

In Tsinghua, Zhang Xinyi was determined to learn agriculture. He and several like-minded classmates, such as Cheng Shaojiong and Xiong Dashi, formed the "New Farmers Association", and agreed to return to the country in the future and work for the improvement of the motherland's agriculture. After graduating from Tsinghua School in 1922, he selected American Iowa University College of Agriculture to study animal husbandry. He also studied genetics at the University of Wisconsin during the summer vacation, practiced forest volume measurement in Michigan, and studied wool processing at the University of Wyoming.

When he was at the Iowa University School of Agriculture, he actively participated in various extracurricular activities, seized every opportunity to do "national diplomacy", and promoted China's history and culture, Confucian and philosophical ideas, the ideal of world unity, and China's agricultural situation. The American people understand China and change their prejudice against the Chinese. He himself practiced it and was stricter with self-discipline, so that he did not lag behind American students in his studies and behaviors.

In 1925, at the age of 28, Zhang Xinyi graduated from the Department of Animal Husbandry, Iowa University Agricultural College. At that time, the students of the "New Farmers Association" met to return to China to start a large farm, but they also felt that they did not have the knowledge of agricultural economics of operating a large farm, so they jointly recommended that he continue to study agricultural economics in the United States. Zhang Xinyi accepted with enthusiasm. In the fall of that year, he entered the postgraduate program of the Department of Agricultural Economics at Cornell University Agricultural College and obtained a master's degree one year later, laying a foundation for becoming an agricultural economist in the future.

When he was about to get a Ph.D., Professor Hualun, the head of the department, recommended that he participate in a five-person investigation group of the US Customs Commission to investigate the production and marketing costs of soybean exports in Japan and China as the basis for determining tariffs. This move coincided with Zhang Xin's desire to go to the Northeast to run a big soybean farm and accepted this task. When he participated in the survey, he always used a relatively high amount of labor to estimate the cost of soybean production, hoping that the US import tax rate would be set at a low point, which would be beneficial to Chinese soybean exports.

After the Northeast investigation was over, he was ordered to investigate the costs of producing, selling, and selling carpets and eggs. When they arrived in Hankou, when the Northern Expeditionary Army hit Wuhan, the revolutionary masses exclaimed and reclaimed the Hankou concession occupied by British and Japanese imperialists. He personally experienced the exciting atmosphere of the Great Revolution at that time and was so passionate that he resigned from the investigation team in the United States and gave up his doctorate in the United States to stay in Shanghai.

Create China's Modern Agricultural Statistics

Facing the current situation in China at the time, Zhang Xin couldn't realize his desire to run a farm. He was recommended to be an associate professor of agricultural economics and director of the department of agricultural extension at the Agricultural College of Nanjing Jinling University. He taught for two years from 1927 to the summer of 1929. At that time, Jinling University was taught in English. The content was all theories and examples from Western countries. It lacked Chinese agricultural economic data. He went to the rural area of Nanjing to conduct a survey, but the information obtained in the survey in one week was finished in one hour. He felt the lack of richer agricultural statistics and was determined to carry out agricultural surveys and statistics nationwide.

In 1929, the Nanjing National Government Legislative Yuan established the Statistics Department. After being invited to be the chief of the Agricultural Statistics Section, he wanted to hold a national agricultural census. At that time, the warlord broke up and the civil war was endless. In order to realize this ideal, he found a way to hire an agricultural rapporteur. He hired more than 1,700 elementary school teachers and farming staff in 23 provinces and more than 600 counties. Volunteer agricultural condition rapporteurs have established a "agricultural condition report" system. Based on these reports, he combined with the county's population, land, area and other data to estimate the agricultural production situation in various provinces and the country, such as the area sown by various crops, the harvest index, the distribution of disasters, and the number of livestock. Thus, the first systematic and scientific agricultural statistical work in the modern history of our country was established.

He also used these materials to study some special issues and wrote a monograph such as "Estimation of the Chinese Population". For the first time, he estimated that the Chinese population was 450 million people at that time, which was recognized by the society. He wrote "A Little Materials on the Problem of Chinese Agricultural Peasants" and "Food Problems in China" at that time, and he was one of the earliest papers that comprehensively studied the modern tenancy system and food problems in China. In 1933, he published his book "A Survey of China's Agriculture", which reflected the basic agricultural situation in 25 provinces in the country with detailed data and charts, and was highly evaluated by scholars at home and abroad. George B. Cressey, a famous American geographer, believed that the book was "not only the latest, but also probably the best agricultural estimate," at the time. His writings during this period are still considered to be precious materials for the study of modern Chinese agricultural economic history.

During this period, he also wrote the paper "Studies on the Season of the Chinese Wheat Planting Season", which for the first time delineated the distribution boundaries of spring and winter wheat in China and the sowing dates of wheat in various places. He also linked the 24 solar terms of the Chinese calendar to the solar calendar It is fixed at the beginning of each month as one solar term, and the latter as another solar term, and is compiled into the "Twenty-four Solar Terms", which is widely disseminated to guide agricultural production.

On January 28, 1932, the Japanese invading army attacked Shanghai, the Songhu Anti-Japanese War was booming, and the organization of the Nanjing National Government changed. Zhang Xin resigned from the statistical office and returned to Jinling University. Due to the war, there is no book to teach. Fortunately, Jinling University's travel expenses can be used to carry out land use surveys. He decided to go to Gansu and Qinghai first, and then to Guangdong, Guangxi, and Fujian to understand the different situations in various places and make some typical surveys. At that time, the society was unstable. This kind of investigation was very difficult. From time to time, we encountered robbers, water and meals. It took one and a half years to complete the investigation. The results were later compiled into the agricultural college of Jinling University. "China Land Use", signed by the head of the economic department, Bu Kai. This book is a relatively comprehensive study of land use in modern China. It has a wealth of information, including Zhang Xinyi's hard work.

In August 1933, the International Association of Agricultural Economists held its third annual meeting in Berlin. Zhang Xinyi went to Germany to attend the annual meeting. Because Hitler came to power, American and Soviet scholars refused to go to Germany to attend the meeting, and the meeting aborted. By the way, he inspected Germany, France, Denmark, Belgium, the United States, Britain, and Japan to understand the agricultural downturn in the capitalist countries at that time, and met a large number of experts and scholars from various countries.

During this period, Zhang Xinyi's agricultural surveys and statistics set a precedent for modern agricultural statistics in China, and attracted the attention of scholars at home and abroad.

Holding agricultural loans to develop agricultural production

After the "September 18th Incident", the Northeast fell, and the Nanjing National Government lost a large amount of foreign trade deficit due to the loss of foreign exchange in soybean exports. Forex deficit. In 1934, Bank of China President Zhang Gongquan invited Zhang Xinyi to handle agricultural loans for Bank of China. Zhang Xinyi considers that investigation and teaching can only stay verbally on paper, so that agricultural loans can be used to develop production so that farmers can get economic benefits. So he left Jinling University and served as the deputy director of the Agricultural Credit Audit and Economic Research Office of Bank of China.

In order to benefit the farmers, he applied for farm loans:

The first is to select a large number of fresh graduates of agricultural colleges to be agricultural loan officers, and help farmers organize cooperatives as loan targets, and prevent landowners and local tyrants from joining cooperatives to control loans;

The second is not to mortgage, so that greedy farmers who have no land to mortgage can get loans;

The third is to simplify loan procedures. There is only one loan condition: money must be used for production, and it must be repaid at maturity. And let the farm loan staff to give farmers ideas and find ways to ensure that the loan is used properly and can make a profit. Such as the promotion of crop varieties and cultivation techniques through farm loans, organization of farmers processing and marketing. Under special circumstances, it also helps farmers to resolve the difficulties of marriage and funeral, so that farmers can rest assured of production.

This method is welcomed by farmers, and the amount of loans is getting larger and larger, starting from several hundred thousand yuan and finally reaching hundreds of millions of yuan; the loan locations are located in more than 20 provinces outside the northeast. Because his farm loan can do things for the benefit of farmers, so almost no amount of the loan can be collected. Although the amount of agricultural loans was over 100 million yuan, there were five or six hundred loan lenders, but his office always had only two staff members.

After the "July 7th Incident", the Japanese invaders attacked aggressively, Ping, Tianjin, Shanghai, Hangzhou, Wuhan, Guangzhou, and half of the country fell. Bank of China moved to Chongqing, and the focus of agricultural loans also moved to Sichuan. Production of grain, cotton and sugar cane. In 1939, the Chongqing National Government set up an agricultural loan committee. The agricultural loan business was changed to be undertaken by the Farmers Bank of China. Zhang Xinyi was also forced to leave the Bank of China.

Create China's First Soil and Water Conservation Station

In the winter of 1940, Zhang Xinyi became a member of the Gansu Provincial Government and director of the Construction Department. This position was not sought by him, but was arranged without seeking his own opinions beforehand. He repeatedly insisted, but was not granted, and had to go to office. And determined to do something good for the people of the hometown in the spirit of "doing something, not being an official".

After taking office, implement the reforms:

First of all, the separation of administrative and enterprise functions was eliminated, and officials of the department and bureau intervened to intervene in the management of the enterprise. The management was organized by the board of directors and the council of each enterprise, eliminating the disadvantages of officials of the Department of Construction seeking power for personal gain. Drought and water shortage in Gansu, he believes that the foundation of building Gansu is the development of water conservancy and forest animal husbandry, so he founded a water conservancy forest animal husbandry company, and at the same time organized a number of local enterprises such as Xinglong Company, cement company, mining company operating light industry and construction industry.

Secondly, a large amount of funds and talents from outside the province were introduced to do what Gansu could not do. For example, the Water Conservancy and Forestry Company borrowed 5 million yuan from the Bank of China, and issued 10 million yuan of water conservancy bonds in the province to obtain 5 million yuan in mortgage cash. That is to say, Gansu himself did not take a little cash and raised 10 million yuan to start a water conservancy forestry and animal husbandry company.

In his tenure, he handled a total of about 3.8 billion yuan in construction costs, investment and loans, of which only 1/10 was raised by the province. He also took advantage of the opportunity for technical personnel to gather in Chongqing during the Anti-Japanese War, and invited many people, such as water conservancy experts Shen Yi, Yuan Suxin, forest scientist Deng Shuqun, animalist Huang Yisheng, agronomist Wang Guoyu, Li Jingxiong, Sheng Jialian, etc. Gansu's participation in the construction solved the lack of talents in Gansu.

During his six-year tenure, he has done the following major things for the construction of Gansu:

In terms of soil and water conservation, he created the nation's first soil and water protection station, Tianshui Station. Afforestation with horizontal ditch and fish scale pit in Xujiashan of Lanzhou City proves that afforestation in barren mountains is also possible on the Loess Plateau with annual rainfall of 300 to 400 mm. This afforestation demonstration project was praised by US Vice President Wallace who visited China at the time, saying that he had the ambition to clarify the Yellow River.

In terms of water conservancy, it expanded about 350,000 acres of irrigated land for Gansu and built the largest earth dam reservoir in the country at the timeHexi Wuchi Reservoir, which resolved water disputes between Jiuquan and Jinta counties for many years.

In terms of forestry, he established a demonstration forest farm for reasonable forest harvesting and sustainable use in the upper reaches of the Luanhe River. This forest farm was maintained until 1970. Yumen Oil Mine will cut trees in the Qilian Mountains to build a 10,000-person dormitory. He insisted on using thinning instead of large pieces of felling and saved a large forest in the Qilian Mountains.

In agriculture, he promoted wheat varieties, and introduced hundreds of forage, melon, fruit and vegetable varieties from foreign countries, including white melons in Lanzhou, as well as fine-wool sheep and friesian cows. The work of preventing and treating wheat smut, and trial planting of sugar beet.

On the industrial side, he started the Gansu Mining Company to mine coal and supply it to Shaanxi and Gansu. Gansu Cement Company produces cement for the Northwest, and Xinglong Company establishes light industries such as papermaking and tanning.

In terms of transportation, 800 kilometers of highways and 1,000 kilometers of railways are built.

Although Zhang Xinyi's undertaking at that time had achievements and had insignificant effects, in the difficult years of the Anti-Japanese War, in the remote and backward history of Gansu, it was a period of prosperity. Some of the enterprises he founded at the time also laid a good foundation for the development of national economy in Gansu Province after liberation.

Zhang Xinyi attaches great importance to talents and has done many practical things for training talents. In 1934, his father died. He never went to the funeral. He sent back 500 yuan in cash and donated it to his hometown Wujiawan (now Fuheyan Township) to build a house and run a primary school in the name of his father's funeral. During the War of Resistance Against Japan, the General Management Office of the Bank of China moved to Hong Kong. The staff of the head office were paid in Hong Kong dollars, and those who stayed in the Mainland were converted into fiat currencies at the exchange rate of Hong Kong dollars and sent to the Mainland. He believes that his family members should share their hardships in the Mainland, and give more than the original legal currency salary to Jinling University as a scholarship fund to help poor students from the enemy-stricken areas with excellent academic performance.

During the Anti-Japanese War, Rewi Alley, a New Zealand progressive, used international aid to set up an industrial cooperation for China. He founded a Peili school in Baoji, Shaanxi, which is a part-time work and training technical personnel. Can't handle it. Zhang Xinyi helped Alli to relocate the school to Shandan, Gansu, and sent his son and nephew to study, expressing his support. He also actively invited local enlightened gentlemen to form a school council. He became the honorary principal and supported Alli to run the school. Harassed by KMT agents. In the post of Director of the Construction Department of Gansu Province, he strongly advocated the recruitment of experts from other provinces to drive the working methods of technical personnel in the province, and introduced and trained a large number of scientific and technical personnel for Gansu. Most of them have become the economic construction technology of Gansu Province after the founding of New China. backbone.

In the victory of the Anti-Japanese War in 1945, Zhang Xinyi was prepared to resign as the director of the Construction Department as originally agreed. After one year, he organized and considered it and wrote an article entitled "Production and Construction in Gansu in the Past Six Years". ", Gave an account of the work done to the people of Gansu, and put forward 4 points of views on the future economic construction of Gansu, mainly:

Transportation, large-scale water conservancy, and hydropower are necessary conditions for promoting industrial and agricultural production. They must be completed in advance by the central human and financial resources;

Heavy industry is the foundation of light industry and should be done first;

The people can run small water conservancy projects, improve agriculture, and plant trees and grasses, but the government and local people must pay attention to it and carefully supervise the people to continue to do it;

The speed of construction depends on talents, but there are not enough talents in this province. It is hoped that outstanding young people will choose production occupations to take up the heavy construction responsibilities. This is enough to show Zhang Xin's consistent and responsible spirit.

On New Year's Day in 1947, Zhang Xinyi left the Gansu Provincial Construction Department to return to the Bank of China, where he went to audit abroad and was in charge of investment in industrial and mining enterprises. However, at that time, the KMT Chiang Kai-shek had set off an anti-communist climax, launched a full-scale attack on the Liberated Area, and did not care about the construction of mines. During this time, Zhang Xinyi did not have much success in his career. But made him care about politics and national affairs. Under the influence of his father-in-law Huang Yanpei and Jinling University alumni Yang Xiandong, he was more concerned about the situation in the liberated area, and was also considering how to build a new China after liberation.

On the other hand, some old classmates and colleagues advised him to go to Taiwan. On the eve of Shanghai's liberation, Sun Liren, a former Tsinghua classmate and senior KMT general, prepared air tickets for him to go to Taiwan, and made a wish that he could serve as the highest agricultural chief after arriving in Taiwan. At this point, Zhang Xinyi was desperate for the Kuomintang and firmly believed that the Communist Party was fighting for the people's interests and would surely succeed. The Communist Party will also have to develop the economy, which requires agricultural technical talents for economic development. Therefore, he stayed firmly and did not go to Taiwan.

Work hard for the development of agriculture in New China

In 1950, Zhang Xinyi was 53 years old and was invited to serve as the director of the Agricultural Planning Division of the Planning Bureau of the Central Finance and Economic Commission. In 1951, at the request of Comrade Chen Yun, he collected ancient and modern Chinese and foreign materials on the discussion of China's agricultural development. After studying the materials he collected, Comrade Chen Yun believed that the development of China's agriculture should be based on increasing the yield per unit area. After discussion by the Party Central Committee and the State Council, it became the guideline for agricultural development. Comrade Chen Yun regarded him as a well-researched authority in this regard. He deeply admired Comrade Chen Yun's serious and cautious attitude towards the cause, and he was also pleased that he had this opportunity to provide the basis for decision-making by the central leadership.

In 1952, the Central Finance and Economic Committee was abolished and Zhang Xinyi was transferred to the Deputy Director of the Soil and Water Utilization Bureau of the Ministry of Agriculture. This bureau was later changed to the Land Use Bureau and the Soil and Fertilizer Bureau, but he served as deputy director and worked diligently on land use until the "cultural revolution" in 1966.

During his tenure, Zhang Xinyi focused on soil and water conservation work. After field investigation and research and practical experience summary, he wrote a book from "Conserving Soil and Water and Developing Agricultural Production". Focusing on publicizing his point, that is to do well in soil and water conservation not only to reduce sedimentation in rivers, but also to develop local agricultural production; to develop agriculture in the Loess Plateau and hilly areas, we must do a good job in soil and water conservation.

In the northwestern drought in 1953, he led a working group of the Ministry of Agriculture for two months to travel through seven special areas of the Loess Plateau in Shaanxi and Gansu provinces, conducted extensive and in-depth investigations, and denied that some foreign experts in the past believed that the Loess Plateau could not Afforestation perspective. In order to affirm the possibility of afforestation on the Loess Plateau, I had not been overwhelmed with fatigue. For seven days, I traveled hundreds of miles a day, walking from Qingyang, Gansu to Fuxian, Shaanxi, and crossing the Ziwuling forest area. During the day, he inspected the night-stay farmhouses, visited and investigated, collected a large amount of information, and wrote a detailed investigation report. And it was processed into the article "Problems of Reasonable Use of Land in the Northwest Loess Plateau". From the height of population and land relations, it was clarified that the root cause of soil and water loss is the land-use method of wide-crop and thin-crop, single crop production.

He believes that in order to overcome soil erosion, it is necessary to combine farmers' mutual assistance and cooperation movements, reform land use methods, carry out water and soil protection, rationally use land, and increase yield per unit area. On the basis of the investigation in 1953, the Ministry of Water Resources formulated the Yellow River Basin Plan for the Yellow River in 1954 and organized a large-scale comprehensive survey. Zhang Xinyi also participated in these surveys and led the Ministry of Water Resources and the Soviet Union that participated in the Yellow River Plan. Experts introduced the experience of afforestation in the Xujiashan ditch in Lanzhou. They also visited the Liujiaxia and Yanguxia dam sites with the leaders of the Ministry of Water Resources along the mountain path that he walked as the chief of construction in the 1940s. Afforestation on the Loess Plateau has become commonplace, and dams have also been built in Liujiaxia and Longyangxia. Zhang Xinyi also devoted much effort to the creation of these undertakings.

When the climax of China's agricultural cooperation came in 1955, the Ministry of Agriculture left the land used by the Soviet government to help establish the state-owned friendship farm in order to merge the small fields of small farmers' economy into large fields suitable for collective management and mechanized farming. The planning expert group held workshops on land planning in Harbin and Beijing. The workshop in Beijing was chaired by Zhang Xinyi, and subsequent training sessions were held in some provinces to train hundreds of land planning cadres. This is China's first batch of land planning talents, and has since become the technical backbone of land use planning and land management.

In the 1960s, Zhang Xin turned his attention to developing green manure production in paddy fields in the south. In order to improve soil fertility, after thorough investigation and research, comprehensive implementation opinions were put forward for the development of green manure. He summed up the experience of developing green manure production in the municipalities (autonomous regions) of the southern provinces in the south, and wrote the article "Further Development of Green Manure Production in Southern China" in 1962 and published it in the "Red Flag" magazine.

After the "Cultural Revolution" began, administrative agencies at all levels were in a state of paralysis. Like many old cadres, he "stood aside". Until 1978, the Chinese Agricultural Association resumed its activities after the Third Plenary Session of the Party. Zhang Xinyi was a full-time Deputy Chairman of the Association at the age of 81. He is still working hard to carry out agricultural academic exchange activities at home and abroad. He has also been appointed as a member of the Scientific and Technological Committee of the Ministry of Agriculture and the Academic Committee of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences. He has been elected as an executive director and consultant of the Chinese Society of Soils and the Chinese Society of Land.

During this time, he wanted to take back the lost time, ride a bicycle to get off work early in the morning, and work with all his energy to study how to realize China's agricultural modernization. Make various suggestions to the leadership from time to time.

For example, after carefully analyzing the relationship between the amount of chemical fertilizer used in China and increasing agricultural production, he put forward a proposal to import phosphate ore from Africa to increase phosphate fertilizer. When he was studying the implementation of the agricultural production responsibility system, he proposed that in the Loess Hilly Region, small watersheds should be used as a unit, and the entire land in the entire watershed should be contracted to farmers for use. At the same time, he should assume the responsibility for reasonable development and protection and seek reasonable and sustainable land use. He actively supported the promotion of a high yield ditch, a soil and water conservation farming method on the Loess Plateau. He also advocated that farmland irrigation, drainage and soil and water conservation should be under the supervision of the agricultural department, because these are closely related issues for farmers to increase production, improve their lives and even benefit future generations.

Zhang Xinyi is a well-known agricultural economist at home and abroad. In 1985, he was 88 years old. A letter from his alma mater, the University of Iowa in the United States, invited him to return to school to participate in the 60th anniversary of his graduation. He was glad to be invited alone.

Back to school this time, he learned that among the more than 500 students who graduated during the same period, there are still 100 people alive 60 years later, and 40 people who can return to school to participate in the celebration. He is the only one who has gone abroad. The principal who wore a gold medal for him was born after they left school. He visited the United States for more than 20 days, and copied back from Hoover Institute of International Studies a full set of publications and survey statistics that he had lost before the Anti-Japanese War. He returned happily at the invitation of the Gansu Provincial People's Government Lanzhou inspected and made academic reports.

On January 17, 1987, during his 90th birthday, the Chinese Agricultural Society and the Chinese Land Society held a celebration for him, and edited and published the "Zhang Xinyi Memorial Collection", which included important works published by him over the years14 Articles.

In 1991, Zhang Xinyi was rated as an agricultural expert who has made outstanding contributions and enjoyed special allowances from the State Council. Zhang Xinyi was the earliest member of the "International Association of Agricultural Economics". The association immediately participated in academic activities. In 1988, the association awarded him the title of "Honorary Life Member".

From 1975 to 1983, he underwent three gastric and rectal resections for cancer. He resisted with strong will and optimism, and went to work by bicycle as soon as he was discharged. He was sent to Qingdao or Beidaihe to recuperate, but he refused, saying that I am afraid of leisure, and I will get sick whenever I am idle. Several times he arranged for him to go abroad for inspections, he refused to go and gave up the quota to the young people.

Zhang Xin had already passed his retirement age, but he never refused to rest for a while. At the age of 91, although he has resigned from all positions, he still insists on going to work every day, reads a lot of foreign language materials, never reads and reads newspapers, and never relaxes and absorbs new knowledge. The then Minister of Agriculture, He Kang, knew the wishes of the elderly and said, "Zhang is a person who does not want to rest. He is willing to come to work or let him go to work." During this time, he contacted the agricultural society's external activities , Modify files, etc., did a lot of useful work.

Zhang Xinyi is such a respectable expert and scholar. He has maintained the good morals of the working people throughout his life, has been diligent, does not seek fame and wealth, and has done many useful things for the motherland and the people. What was done.