BEIJING - Perhaps the days when hundreds of millions of Chinese migrant workers had no choice but render their land desolate to find jobs in the city are gone.

In 2011, more and more have benefited from transferring, leasing, or mortgaging land-use rights, said Uyunqimg, vice chairperson of the Standing Committee of the National People' s Congress (NPC), China's top legislature, in her report Wednesday on the implementation of the law on rural land contracts.

A total of 207 million mu (13.8 million hectares) has been involved in land-use transfers in 2011, accounting for 16.2 percent of the total area of contracted arable land, according to the report.

Under China's existing land ownership structure, rural collectives own the land. The collective, often a village committee, distributes land-use rights to households on 30-year "household management" contracts.

In October 2008, the central government issued a landmark land policy that allowed farmers to lease contracted farmland or transfer land-use rights.

According to Uyunqimg, 229 million households joined the "household management" contract by the end of 2011.

The top legislature sent a team to ascertain how a law on rural-land contracts has been implemented in order to prevent farmers' land rights from being infringed.

Wu Bangguo, chairman of the NPC Standing Committee, said in a written comment that the inspections are aimed at helping protect farmers' rights in the land-contract system, maintain the system's stability, and strengthen the management and services regarding the transfer of farmers' land contract management rights.

The team went in six separate groups to the provinces of Hebei, Jilin, Anhui, Shandong, Hunan and Gansu from August to October.