The 100-day crackdown on the illegal seizure of land ended on Monday, with 2,300 officials given disciplinary punishments, more than 2,700 people transferred to judicial departments for trials and more than 3,700 officials waiting to be disciplined.

The largest campaign ever launched by the Ministry of Land and Resources has been deemed a success. It involved investigations of more than 30,000 cases of illegal land seizures, affecting about 222,000 hectares of land.

Minister of Land and Resources Xu Shaoshi was quoted as saying the campaign had significantly reduced the illegal approval and use of land. But we still have a long way to go before officials at various levels are made to toe the line when it comes to protecting the country's limited arable land resources.

The top three violations were: leasing land from villagers instead of through outright acquisition, effectively circumventing the land approval process; illegally expanding development zones or setting up new zones; and occupying land without going through the proper legal procedures.

The message is that many officials have turned a blind eye to both the laws governing land use and the repeated notices issued by the State Council highlighting the urgent need to protect arable land.

Lenient penalties for offenders are also to blame for the audacity with which these offenders have broken the law. Even the land minister admitted that the punishments have been too light.

The central government has set a strategic goal of maintaining the amount area of arable land at no less than 120 million hectares, which would be enough to basically guarantee food stability. The country now has about 122 million hectares of arable land.

With a population of 1.3 billion, the importance of having enough land for farming cannot be overemphasized, especially since property deals have emerged as an important source of local revenue - and illegal gains - for local governments.

The 100-day crackdown is more than necessary, but far from enough. We have heard time and again from land and resources authorities that more severe penalties will be meted out to illegal land seizers. The minister said again on Monday that the crackdown will be more severe in the future and that a permanent mechanism will be put in place to supervise land use. We hope he meant it.

(China Daily January 24, 2008)