A reassuring message is given to farmers

One day after the opening session of the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, I received a phone call from a former middle-school classmate. He had been the class monitor but is now a successful tea plantation manager in Rizhao, Shandong province.

The phone call was about his business: After renting 133 hectares of land from local farmers several years ago to plant green tea trees, he became the richest person in my old class.

In China, farmers may obtain the right to use a piece of land from the village committees that own it. Managers, such as my former classmate, may rent the land from those farmers.