The central government is pinning its hope on the rural areas' fee-to-tax reform to reduce farmers' financial burdens and help increase their incomes.

A pilot programme was begun in November 1999 in East China's Anhui Province to replace the arbitrary fees with a single agricultural tax of about 8 per cent.

Random collection of unwarranted fees and unnecessary charges by local governments will be stopped. Going by rural tax reforms, only the fees approved by the central government will be collected as agricultural tax.

Premier Zhu Rongji described the fee-to-tax reform as "a fundamental way of reducing the burden on farmers". In his government work report to the National People's Congress on March 5, Zhu pledged to extend the scope of reform experiments, mainly in the major grain producing and agricultural provinces of Central China.

Agricultural experts, however, say that without a co-ordinating comprehensive rural modifying package, rural taxation reform may achieve little in solving China's rural and agricultural problem.

"The fee-to-tax reform has undoubtedly raised the hope of promoting development and stability in the countryside," says a research fellow with the Centre of Rural Economy Studies under the Ministry of Agriculture, Wen Tiejun. "But... wider, more intense reforms are needed..."

The researcher says it's very unlikely that a single reform package will work wonders in the countryside, which is burdened with complex problems and saddled with contradictions.

"Only a comprehensive rural reform can solve the agriculture problem," says Wen. To ensure the success of the main reform measures, simultaneous moves also should be taken to straighten up the relationship of property among farmers, collective units and the State and streamline governments at township and village levels.

A comprehensive rural reform package should include smoother regulation of property relationship in rural distribution through restructuring of financial and taxation, strengthening democratic values and practices at the grassroots and village levels, promoting rural educational reform and building closer relations between the Party and rural residents.

Media reports have said the Anhui fee-to-tax reform experiment has been progressing well, remarkably reducing farmers' financial burdens by doing away with unnecessary levies.

Economist Wei Jie, has however, expressed doubts over the reform. He says the arbitrary fees will return if township and village governments don't have enough money to run their operations because of the reform.

"The heavy burden of farmers won't be truly reduced unless the State allots adequate funds for rural administration and construction," the Tsinghua University professor says.

"If that's not done, all the slogans and decisions will be useless," warns Wei.