farmers' rights · Full chronicle and history

Recently, a netizen uploaded a video on Douyin showing a man lying next to a truck, repairing it while receiving an IV drip. Netizens commented, 'You spend your whole life trading human flesh for pork,' sparking sighs over the living conditions of low-income laborers.

On November 10, thousands of comments appeared under a Douyin video related to human trafficking, with many netizens sharing their own experiences or those of people around them who had been trafficked.

On the evening of November 9, a student passed away at the Zhuhai Campus of Jinan University for unknown reasons, and the police immediately sealed off the scene.

Recently, netizens in many places posted on social media platforms that they had received calls from 12340, the national social sentiment and public opinion survey hotline, where staff asked about their satisfaction with local public security and their daily living conditions.

A video recently circulated on Douyin showing a shirtless, emaciated elderly person bending over to rummage through a roadside trash can. Commenters left sarcastic remarks, saying this is the older generation of farmers who handed over their grain quotas — this is what “care in old age” looks like.

Economist Yao Yang, Dean of the Dishui Lake Advanced School of Finance at Shanghai University of Finance and Economics, said in a video posted on "Yao Yang Shuo" that about 100 million people in China actually pay individual income tax, that an annual income of 100,000 to 120,000 yuan puts one in the top 10% by income, and that an annual income of about 300,000 yuan puts one in the top 1%. The bottom 10% of earners account for only 0.4% of all income and have negative net wealth, and around 600 million people nationwide still earn less than 1,000 yuan per month.

On October 22, a netizen posted that their house was washed away in a flood, and that their homestead had been reallocated in the post-disaster reconstruction plan and designated as a public parking lot, making it impossible to rebuild on the original site. The comment section sparked heated discussion.

On October 20, Guan Quan, an economics professor at Renmin University of China, posted a video on social media pointing out that urban residents' years of service before 1992 can be converted and counted as deemed contributions, while farmers who paid grain tax for decades cannot, saying that although it is technically difficult, "it's actually not that hard."

On October 17, a Douyin blogger complained that young people are told to abandon the “student mindset” as soon as they enter society, asking why honest people should reflect on themselves after being taken advantage of, and saying that those who cheat and deceive are the ones who should truly reflect. The post struck a chord with netizens, who left comments in共鸣.

A land dispute occurred in Dongguan Village, Mei County, Baoji, Shaanxi. Villagers say local authorities deployed police to assist a city investment company in occupying land to build a food market.

A netizen inside the Great Firewall shared records of fines imposed on their family by the Chinese Communist Party. The fines covered a wide range of items, and the specific items were not detailed in the tweet.

Because the Luchin Expressway construction project included no drainage system, the road has been flooded for a long time; villagers' collective rights defense led to a clash when large numbers of police and riot personnel arrived on the scene.

Around October 12, a netizen showed a text message confirming the deposit of the central farmland productivity protection subsidy, in the amount of only 0.32 yuan, contrasting with the high pensions enjoyed by those inside the system.

The developer entered the site for construction without the villagers' consent to hand over the land and hired thugs who attacked the villagers with dry powder fire extinguishers and pepper water; after police arrived, they took no coercive measures against the thugs.

On October 2, YouTube creator Bumingbai Podcast released an episode, gathering letters from eleven listeners to discuss various experiences of feeling inferior while living in China.

Li Hufu, a farmer in Qingdao, Shandong, posted a video stating that a tricycle load of over 300 catties of green onions sold for less than 40 yuan, averaging out to 12 fen per catty, which has sparked widespread concern over the difficult living conditions of elderly people in rural areas.

On September 22, CCTV.com published "CCTV Quick Commentary: Strive to Make the Lives of the Vast Number of Farmers Happier and Better," focusing on Xi Jinping extending Harvest Festival greetings to farmers across the country, and proposing to protect grain-growing returns through measures such as prices, subsidies and insurance; netizens commented sarcastically that it "sounds nice."

On September 17, a netizen uploaded an AI short film to Douyin in which a young person runs desperately while carrying a basket on their back containing their parents, only to be criticized for falling behind, sparking widespread resonance and discussion among netizens about the heavy burden of family.

Some netizens discussed protests by tobacco farmers in Yunnan, saying that farmers were mobilized by the government to grow tobacco, with promises of considerable income, but at purchase time the tobacco leaves were only bought for a few yuan per kilogram, leaving them with just a few dozen yuan of income after working more than half a year on one mu of land.

On September 16, villagers of Xujiaogou Village in Tangshan, Hebei, protested the pollution and environmental damage caused by iron ore mining. The local government mobilized staff, police and SWAT forces into the village to suppress the rights-defending villagers and forcibly push ahead with mine construction.

In September 2026, some tobacco farmers in Yunnan held rallies to defend their rights after tobacco companies tightened their leaf purchasing standards, downgraded and cut the price of their tobacco leaves, or even refused to buy them. Some farmers said that over a thousand jin of tobacco leaves fetched only a few dozen yuan after grading deductions for weight.

On August 18, 2026, it was reported online that in Shining Village, Tangpeng Town, Lianjiang City, Zhanjiang, Guangdong, personnel from the Juxinyuan Mining Company were suspected of violently seizing villagers' mountain and forest land and beating villagers and minors, triggering a fierce physical clash.

On August 13, 2026, several villagers in Guhang Village, Luxin Town, Wuxuan County, Laibin, Guangxi, blocked a road in protest and to defend their rights after compensation payments for a quarry's mountain excavation were embezzled. Security and riot personnel arrived at the scene to handle the situation and took away several villagers.

On the evening of August 12, 2026, multiple villagers in Lincuo Village, Waisha Subdistrict, Longhu District, Shantou, Guangdong gathered in a sit-in protest, objecting to the authorities changing agricultural household registration to resident household registration without public notice, and demanding protection of collective land rights.

On August 8, 2026, a blogger disclosed that in the high-standard farmland improvement project in Mingshui County, Suihua, Heilongjiang, the topsoil of some plots had been hauled away, leaving bare subsoil, resulting in severe yield losses for nearly 3,000 mu of soybeans and corn, even facing total crop failure.

After the Daxiaojing Scenic Area in Luodian, Guizhou, handed over operations to the "Minsheng Company," villagers were prohibited from using bamboo rafts to carry passengers. Villagers began protesting on July 18, and on July 24, they clashed with government personnel, police (Public Security), and company staff.

After Black Sea shipping routes were disrupted, China turned to South and North America for emergency spot purchases of grain, with international grain traders charging an extra $42.5 per ton.

China's total retail sales of consumer goods rose 0.6% year-on-year in July; retail sales of automobiles fell 13.2% year-on-year from January to July.

From June 26 to 30, 2026, villagers of Lincuo Village, Waisha Street, Longhu District, Shantou, Guangdong gathered for several consecutive days to defend their rights, protesting that the village committee sold off collective land without the villagers' consent, and demanding the restoration of household registration status that had been altered to non-agricultural without authorization.

Villagers of Lincuo Village, Longhu District, Shantou, had their agricultural household registrations arbitrarily converted to non-agricultural household registrations. After sitting-in for rights defense for a month, they escalated their actions, with hundreds occupying the village committee and engaging in physical clashes with the police.

In May 2026, China's total retail sales of consumer goods fell 0.6% year-on-year, marking the first monthly decline since December 2022, with sharp drops in sales of automobiles, home appliances, building materials and other categories.

On May 21, 2026, regarding the incident where over 700 mu of shepherd's purse crops were swarmed, stolen, and looted by surrounding villagers, a farmer in Neihuang, Henan, formally submitted a criminal case application to the local police, demanding that the crime of intentional destruction of property be investigated and compensation for losses be made.

In May 2026, the total retail sales of consumer goods in China fell by 0.6% year-on-year.

State Grid's Yantai–Weihai UHV line project entered Jiaoxi Town, Jiaozhou City, Shandong for construction without paying any compensation, and a female villager climbed a high-voltage tower in protest.

On the afternoon of May 7, 2013, at 5 pm, 18 days before the wedding date, the demolition team of the Beigaoying Village Committee forcibly demolished Jia Jinglong's wedding home with an excavator. His father was restrained, relatives were beaten, Jia Jinglong was injured in the head, and the engagement was later broken off.

After Jia Jinglong's marital home was forcibly demolished in May 2013, he repeatedly wrote letters of complaint to the Chang'an District Procuratorate and the district letters and visits bureau, and repeatedly sought talks with village head He Jianhua over compensation, all to no avail.

In 2001, Hu Wenhai of Shanxi, after being oppressed by village official thugs for a long time, killed multiple people with weapons. The case shocked the whole country at the time, and a large number of related videos circulated online.

After 1949, a large number of Chinese social elites left China; related accounts regard this as the starting point of the subsequent changes in social structure.