There are four sectors in the agricultural field, including agricultural, forestry, animal husbandry and fishery industries.

The present production structure is in the readjusting process in China's agricultural field. In 2002, the total annual cultivated area in the agricultural field was103.99 million hectares, reduced by 2.09 million hectares. Among them, the total cultivated area of cotton was 4.18 million hectares, reduced by 0.63 million hectares; that of oil plants was 14.87 million hectares, increased by 0.24 million hectares; the one of sugar plants was 1.8 million hectares, increased by 0.15 million hectares while the cultivated area of vegetables was 17.28 million hectares, increased by 0.88 million hectares. The output was increased in the main agricultural products such as grains, oil plants and sugar plants, and the one of vegetables was also increased continuously in parallel with its quality increase while that of cotton was decreased because of the reduction in its cultivated area. The annual output of the agricultural products totaled 457.11million tons, increased by 1% over the previous year.

China's agriculture is developing into a new stage and the great change is taking place in the relation between demand and supply. The development of agriculture should fit for the market demand and agricultural production structure should be readjusted and optimized. For honoring the commitments of China's accession to the WTO and meeting the need of promoting the strategic readjustment in agricultural structure in this situation, the comparative market advantages should be enhanced, the imbalanced development strategy shall be carried out for protecting the interests of the competitive groups and supporting their activities and the strategies of Winning by Quality should also be stuck to. While bringing the market functional allocation of resources into a basic play, the reasonable regional deployment and professional diversions should be formed so that the international competitiveness of China's agriculture can be greatly improved within a short period of time by means of enhancing the macro economic control, carrying out priority policies, deploying the key elements of agricultural production reasonably and effectively, developing the advantaged breeding and regional cultivation and strengthening a number of the production zone with its international competitiveness.

New achievements have been accomplished in forestry construction. By end of 2002, 7.47 million hectares of young growth were constructed, increased by 51% over the previous year. Among them, 5.4 million hectares were planted through the projects of returning land for farming to forestry and planting in uncultivated land, indicating the great progress achieved by the project of returning land for farming to forestry. Other progresses have also been achieved such as furthering the protection engineering of natural woods, enforcing the construction of shelter forests in the Northwest, Northeast and North China (Three North) and the Yangtze River Valley, fully carrying out the sand prevention and controlling around Beijing and Tianjin, as well as the remarkable progress in wild protection around the country and the construction of the natural protection area and the strong development in the construction of fast growing and economic forest bases. The full start of these projects means a historic change from wood production to ecological construction in China's forest industry.

Fast development has been made in China's animal husbandry. The total output of meat reached 65.9 million tons in 2002, increased by 4% over the previous year. China abounds in the resources of beef and mutton as well as grasses and feedstuffs. A number of high-quality breeds have been imported recently and the related complementary breeding system has also been formed with the great improvement of the meat processing and its technology. According to the requirements of the scaled breeding with the improved technology, together with the high quality and safety protection as well, more efforts have been made in expanding the fine beef and mutton, speeding up the construction of epidemic prevention zones, developing the breeding in the standardized and moderate scale, improving the processing techniques, fully increasing the unit production and improving the its quality and safety, as well as furthering the export and increasing the proportion of high quality meats in domestic market.

The fishery industry sustained a steady development in 2002. The total output of aquatic products reached 45.13 million tons, increased by 3%. China is one of the world big fishery and farming countries, with its aquatic products accounting for 70% of the world ones. The advanced farming technological system has been formed and there exists the great potential in expanding the product export with its first place position in China's agricultural product exports presently. The main tasks are to have a great increase in high-quality breeding and its product processing, to have an effective control in aquatic diseases and to have a remarkable increase in the export proportion of aquatic products by attaching the importance to the three key sectors including product quality and safety, breeding and fine processing.

In the field of FDI, there were 975 foreign-invested agricultural projects in 2002, accounting for 2.85% of the total, with a contractual value of US$1.688 billion, accounting for 2.04% of the total contractual value. The real value of FDI used in 2002 reached US$1.028 billion, accounting for 1.95% of FDI in real value.

According to the commitments after China's accession to the WTO, the average tariff level of China's agricultural products will be reduced from the present 19.9% to 15.5% in 2005. According to the Protocol of Agriculture, China has committed to abolish export subsidy for the agricultural products whilst maintain the rights of special and non-special supporting measures as well as its policy support falling into the extent of Green Box.