The Chinese government will continue tightening its management of the use of arable land, while cracking down upon illegal sale of land rights, Chinese Vice Premier Zeng Peiyan said Friday.
  
It is the government policy to protect existing arable land which is very limited compared to China's population, Zeng said during his visit to south China's Guangdong Province, northeast China's Liaoning Province and east China's Zhejiang Province.
  
The Chinese government will begin approving commercial use of arable land in about a month. The government temporarily stopped this use in April as an effort to calm the overheating economy.
  
It will be a hard task for the administration to prevent illegal transactions of use right of arable land, Zeng said.
  
Not all problems have been settled, though progress was made since the country started rectifying land development last year. This includes abolishing development zones that were established against regulations, he said.
  
The administration will protect the collective ownership of land in rural areas in line with laws, while cracking down upon illegal transaction of land use rights, Zeng said.
  
Measures will be adopted to regulate the use of income from land transactions in a bid to protect the interests of farmers that lose their land, he added.
  
The governments of all levels, especially the provincial governments, are required to improve their supervision on land use and development, Zeng said.

(Xinhua News Agency October 9, 2004)