By Antoaneta Bezlova

BEIJING, Oct 13 (IPS) - Faced with a deepening global financial meltdown, the Chinese communist party is contemplating far-reaching internal reforms capable of insulating the country from the worst effects of the crisis such as by loosening its grip over land ownership.

Chinese leaders plan to relinquish partial control of the country's most important asset -- the land, and allow peasants more freedom to lease or transfer their land use rights.

The idea is to stimulate domestic demand and expand China's underdeveloped internal market to counter the global economic slowdown that has dried up orders for Chinese exports. Freeing up rural productivity is also seen as the only way for China to guarantee long-term food sufficiency for its 1.3 billion people.

The leadership, led by president and party chief Hu Jintao, released a communiqué on Sunday at the end of a four-day, high-profile party meeting, which approved the reform plan.

"We must depend on ourselves ...add impetus to expanding domestic demand, especially consumer demand, and maintain a stable economy and stable financial and capital markets," it said.

The meeting acknowledged that the country faced greater challenges because of the global financial crisis, which would amplify the "contradictions and problems" of its own economy.

"We must solidify and strengthen the status of agriculture and place as top priorities the running of the nation and resolving once and for all the basic problem of food for hundreds of millions,'' the document said.

For a country which remains nominally committed to the pursuit of socialism, the idea of privatising the land sounds so radical that party ideologues have opposed even the use of the term "private land ownership".

The party plenum document speaks of "mind emancipation" in regard to rural reform without giving any details on the new land regulations. More specifics are expected to emerge in coming days but the plan would be implemented only after the National People's Congress -- China's parliament -- approves it at its annual session next March.

"It will not be easy to realise a full and genuine privatisation of rural land," Guo Shutian, a senior agricultural policy official told the 21st Century Economic Herald. "For one, it would take a revision of the Chinese constitution. The biggest obstacle though remains ideology. Private ownership of the land is still unacceptable to many party members".

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