Search Results (59)

The interaction between rural household livelihood strategies and land use behavior constitutes the core of the human–land relationship in a region, especially in protected area villages with high ecological sensitivity that require the integration of social–economic and ecological benefits. This study, grounded in the concept of sustainable livelihoods, utilizes survey data from 399 households in the Chang-Zhu-Tan Green Heart Ecological Protection Zone. By employing the entropy method to calculate indicator weights, a coupling coordination degree model is constructed to analyze the coupling degree, coordination degree, and spatial differentiation patterns between household livelihood strategies and land use behavior. The findings reveal that (1) there is a coupling relationship between household livelihood strategies and land use behavior in the protected area, characterized by moderate coupling coordination. (2) Agricultural sideline households exhibit the highest degree of coupling coordination. The sideline activities of these households not only enhance income but also exert positive impacts on the ecological environment while they are engaged in agricultural production. (3) There is a significant spatial differentiation in the coupling coordination degree of different types of households in the protected area: it increases with the distance from the urban center, with higher values in the central areas than in the peripheral regions. The results of this study provide a basis for understanding micro-level land use changes and guiding household land use behavior, as well as offering theoretical and practical references for improving sustainable livelihoods of households in the study area, promoting rural revitalization, and implementing ecological protection policies. Full article

The support of external organizational forces is essential for the promotion of agricultural ecological efficiency to improve agricultural green development and boost China’s prosperity in agriculture. To identify the different impact of different organizational support on improving farmers’ agricultural ecological efficiency and investigate the mechanism by which organizational support affects agricultural ecological efficiency, this study explores the internal logic of farmers’ promotion of agricultural ecological efficiency and empirically examines the impact of organizational support and knowledge distance on agricultural ecological efficiency using 1011 household-level survey data from Henan province in China. The study shows the following: (1) Enhancing organizational support can significantly promote agricultural ecological efficiency, and the effect of organizational support in descending order is agricultural material distributors, peasant cooperatives, village committees, agricultural technology service centers, and agricultural associations. (2) Knowledge distance partially mediates the influence of organizational support on agricultural ecological efficiency. The mediating mechanism of spatial distance is the most significant, followed by content distance and cognitive distance. (3) Market-oriented organizations play a stronger role in incremental support, and government organizations play a stronger role in radical support. This study adds considerable value to the empirical literature and provides precise guidance for improving agricultural ecological efficiency. Full article

With China’s urbanization process and changes in rural family structures, the abandonment of farmland in scattered villages within hilly mountainous regions is becoming an increasingly serious issue, restricting the improvement of land use efficiency. This study analyzes the basic characteristics and variations in abandoned farmland by conducting surveys and interviews with peasants in a scattered village in southern China. Using the Heckman two-stage model, we perform empirical analysis on the factors influencing farmland abandonment, addressing potential sample selection bias. The findings show the following: peasants with better health and higher education levels are more likely to transition to non-agricultural occupations which contributes to an increased abandonment of farmland. However, larger and more integrated land parcels, along with favorable farming conditions, help reduce abandonment. Additionally, rural land transfer and agricultural subsidies are important factors that enhance farmland utilization and mitigate abandonment. These results provide a reference for addressing the abandonment of farmland and improving both the farming environment and social policies in rural villages. Full article

The participation of farmers in environmental governance is not simply the behavior choice of individuals but is also influenced by their socioeconomic status (SES). Using survey data from 2088 peasant households in Jiangsu Province, China, this study used the ordered probit model to identify the differential impacts of objective socioeconomic status (OSES) and subjective socioeconomic status (SSES) on farmers’ participation in rural living environmental governance behavior (FPLEB). The mediation effect model was also used to explore the mediating role of environmental cognition in the relationship between SES and FPLEB. The results reveal that (1) SES (i.e., OSES and SSES) is a positive factor affecting farmers’ involvement in improving their living environment, with SSES demonstrating a stronger correlation with efforts to enhance rural living conditions than OSES, (2) environmental knowledge and pollution cognition serve as mediating factors, bridging the effect of OSES on the level of participation in environmental governance, and (3) SES (i.e., OSES and SSES) is more effective in fostering future-oriented environmental governance behaviors among farmers than those with a present-oriented mindset. Full article

Relocating poor people in mountainous areas to centralized settlement sites is an important poverty alleviation policy implemented by China and a key measure to promote stable poverty alleviation and sustainable rural development for the poor. Based on the survey data of 405 peasant households in the Panxi Area in 2021, this study constructed a structural equation model (SEM) to explore the influencing factors of peasant households’ willingness to relocate to a concentrated residence. The results showed the following: (1) Of the 405 peasant households surveyed, 20.98% were unwilling to move to centralized resettlement sites, making it more difficult to carry out the relocation policy for poverty alleviation. (2) Living environment, living conditions, important social groups, the economic benefits, living benefits, and survival benefits brought by concentrated residences, governments, and the village committees significantly influenced the willingness to relocate to a concentrated residence. In contrast, agricultural income, ecological benefits, and value benefits brought by the concentrated residence had little effect on the willingness to relocate to a concentrated residence. (3) Land force, human force, cognitive force, and national force significantly positively affected the peasant households’ willingness to relocate to a concentrated residence. This study is of great significance in promoting the implementation of poverty alleviation and relocation policy, improving the efficiency of relocation and promoting the wellbeing of peasant households. Full article

This paper explores the significance of digital governance for sustainable rural development in China, emphasizing the collaborative efforts of village administrative organizations, new agricultural business entities, and peasant households. Utilizing an evolutionary game approach, we examine the decision-making behaviors and stability points of these three entities within the context of rural digital governance. Our analysis is grounded in a mechanism of interest linkage among the stakeholders, with numerical simulations used to assess the impact of key variables and parameters on their evolutionary outcomes. The paper reveals that village administrative organizations are highly sensitive to changes in performance gains, special subsidies, penalty losses, and benefit distribution coefficients. Enhancing these variables can significantly motivate these organizations to engage in digital governance. In contrast, new agricultural business entities and peasant households demonstrate a stronger and more consistent willingness to collaborate, minimally affected by variable changes, which suggests a solid economic and social foundation for rural digital governance in China. Our paper underscores the need for positive incentives and a robust fault-tolerance mechanism to foster collaboration among village administrative organizations. It also highlights the importance of integrating new agricultural business entities into the digital governance framework to promote sustainable rural development. These insights provide valuable theoretical and practical implications for policymakers aiming to enhance the efficacy and inclusivity of digital governance in rural China. Full article

How rural land transfer affects the growth of non-agricultural income and the changes in its sources are important research topics. This study uses the micro-data from the China Family Panel Studies (CFPS) spanning from 2014 to 2020 and empirically analyzes the impact of rural land transfer on the growth of non-agricultural income, based on a multi-dimensional decomposition of rural household income structure. This study found that (1) land transfer has a significant promoting effect on the growth of non-agricultural income. Transferring out land is conducive to increasing wage income and transfer income, while transferring in land compensates for the decrease in operating income by achieving a higher operating income, ultimately leading to an increase in total income. (2) The effect of land transfer on the growth of non-agricultural income is higher in the Eastern region than in the Central and Western regions. The higher the education level of family members, the greater the income-increasing effect of land transfer on farmers. (3) Mechanism analysis shows that land transfer increases farmers’ opportunities for migrant work and improves farmers’ operational efficiency, which are the main channels for the growth in non-agricultural income. This study demonstrates that land circulation will promote farmers’ income growth and prosperity through rental income, share cooperation and dividends, labor transfer and wage income, industrial chain extension and value-added income, and policy support and subsidies. Full article

This study delves into perceptions of land and forest tenure (in)security among Indigenous and mestizo populations in the Peruvian Amazon. Despite all having collective lands, the selected communities vary in their formalisation processes. This research seeks to enhance comprehension of tenure security perceptions in the Peruvian Amazon by investigating sources of security and insecurity across key tenure components. A combination of descriptive, bivariate, and multivariate analyses is employed, based on fieldwork conducted between July 2015 and December 2017 in 22 Native and Peasant Communities in Loreto and Madre de Dios, utilising 1006 intra-household surveys, 52 in-depth interviews, and 44 focus group discussions. The results reveal similarities and differences in (in)security sources between titled and untitled communities. The study also explores the influence of gender and ethnicity on these perceptions, finding ethnicity-based variation in security perception over the past 20 years (1995–2015). Recognising these differences in perception is critical for assessing the robustness of exercising acquired collective rights. Full article

The success of the geographical indication industry relies on the collaborative value creation among its stakeholders. This article presents an evolutionary game model for the triad of associations, firms, and peasant households in the geographical indication industry. The model examines their strategic choices and analyzes the impact of profitability, scale factors, and premium factors across different developmental stages. The study uncovers that while all parties may display collective behavior, there are variations specific to each stage. In periods of low profitability, firms tend to adopt a more cautious approach, while peasant households prioritize overall benefits. Both scale factors and premium factors guide the game towards positive strategies. Consequently, it is recommended to strengthen associations’ leadership role by fostering firm accountability in quality governance, reducing costs and risks associated with peasant household participation, safeguarding their rights and interests, enhancing economies of scale for geographical indication products, and bolstering competitiveness and sustainability. Full article

The transfer of farmland is an important area of rural development research; however, the impact of rural social networks has been neglected in studies. The aim of this study is to explore the effects, mechanisms, and heterogeneity of neighbors’ behavior on the process of land renting by farmers. Based on the data of the China Family Panel Studies in 2018, this research empirically analyzes the impact of community-level, local social interactions on the land rental behavior of farmers and its mechanisms using a spatial probit model. The results of this study indicate that neighbors’ land rental behavior positively and significantly affects that of other farmers in the same village. In addition, neighbors’ land rental encourages other farmers in the same village to follow suit through an increase in the perceived importance of the Internet among the farmers. In addition, there is heterogeneity in neighborhood influence. Notably, the impact of social networks on the renting out of the land by farmers, as evidenced in this study, is a key factor in accelerating the circulation of rural land and promoting rural development, thus contributing to the process of rural revitalization and its recording in the literature. Full article

The problem of high grain production costs, which is not conducive to sustainable agricultural development and food security, is highlighted in the context of China’s “large country and small household farmers”. Reducing the grain production costs through factor allocation and organizational drive has become particularly important. Based on 768-grain peasant households in China, this paper uses OLS regression and robust regression to examine the effects of agricultural factor inputs and cooperatives on grain production costs. It analyzes the synergistic and substitution effects between farmers’ factor inputs and cooperatives in grain production. It was found that: (1) in farmers’ grain production, reductions in the grain production costs can be realized by expanding the area under cultivation, improving the use of agricultural machinery, and increasing technological inputs; (2) a reduction in the grain production costs can also be realized through cooperatives driving farmers into grain production; (3) cooperatives can provide farmers with various types of agricultural production services in grain production and cooperative-driven substitution effects between the agricultural factor inputs of farm households. The findings of this paper contribute to the enrichment of research in the field of agricultural production and are important for enhancing agricultural sustainability and reducing grain production costs. Full article

Vegetation on the Loess Plateau, China, has continuously improved thanks to certain ecological restoration (ER) strategies, including the integrated soil conservation project that began in the late 1970s and the “Grain for Green” project that began in the 1990s. The experience of these strategies in different geomorphological regions is of great value to ER worldwide. In this study, the evolution of the land-use transition (LUT) pathway and ecosystem service value (ESV) in four geomorphological regions of the Beiluo River Basin was analyzed using geo-informatic Tupu and the equivalent factor method with data from 1975 to 2015. The results indicated that, from 1975 to 2015, the proportion of forestland in the Beiluo River basin increased by 18.27%, while the areas of shrub, grassland, cultivated land, and water decreased by 1.03%, 0.16%, 18.23%, and 0.26%, respectively. In the past 40 years, the overall ESV of the basin increased by USD 3.209 billion (54.16%). The landform, vegetation cover, LUT, and ESV analysis indicated that the main ecological functions of the loess hilly and gully (LHG), loess plateau gully (LPG), rocky mountain (RM), and terrace and plain (TP) regions are soil and water conservation (SWC), SWC and food production, regulation and food production, respectively. ER projects enhanced the main ecological function of individual regions. In detail, the transition of “cultivated land → grassland” enhanced SWC function in the LHG region, and the transition of “grassland (shrub) → forestland” enhanced the regulating services of the RM and LPG regions. Moreover, the transition of “cultivated land to grassland” did not seriously lower the food production services of the TP and LPG regions, owing to the increase in grain yield per unit area. However, there were alternating transitions between cultivated land and ecological land types, implying a game between the peasant households’ demands and the ER strategies. Conflicting demands between local households and the public necessitate precision ER strategies, including land planning, ecological compensation, training and employment for local residents, etc. Full article

Promoting withdrawal from rural homesteads (WRH) is a significant way of enhancing the efficient use of homesteads, improving the living standards of farmers, and promoting new urbanization. Social networks provide farmers with necessary resources and play an important role in the practices of WRH. Based on a literature review, this paper divides farmers’ social networks into the emotional social network, the economic social network, and the political social network and analyzes the impacts of social networks on farmers’ willingness and behavior regarding WRH using the binary logistic regression model, based on the data of 299 peasant households in Sichuan Province. The following finds are established: (1) the economic social network significantly and negatively affects farmers’ willingness and behavior regarding WRH, while the political social network has a positive impact on farmers’ willingness and behavior regarding WRH; (2) the emotional social network significantly and positively affects farmers’ willingness regarding WRH, but it does not have a significant effect on farmers’ behavior regarding WRH; and (3) the economic social network and political social network exhibit opposite influences on the transition from farmers’ willingness to behavior regarding WRH. We conclude that social networks play a vital role in affecting farmers’ willingness and behavior regarding WRH. The research suggests that expanding the scope of farmers’ interactions and social networks can be helpful in implementing WRH. The employment training system and social security system should also be improved. Full article

Farmland transfer (FT) is the key to achieving moderate agricultural scale management in China. Clarifying the spatial pattern of FT is important to improve FT strategies. In this study, the multinomial logit model was used to reveal the spatial pattern of FT in Liaoning Province, Northeast China. On this basis, the reasons for its formation were discussed, and suggestions were proposed. According to the statistical results, 39.7% of the sample peasant households participated in FT. Most of them live far from the regional core area. Regression analysis shows that the FT in Liaoning Province has a significant “core-periphery” spatial pattern. As the spatial distance between the residence and the regional core area (SDRRC) increases, the probability of FT rises for peasant households. Specifically, the odds ratios of farmland transfer out and farmland transfer in rise by 0.9% and 0.6% on average, respectively, for each 1 km increase in SDRRC. Widespread concurrent business and the increase in FT fees due to imperfect urbanization are the main reasons for the formation of the spatial pattern. We suggest that the promotion of FT requires high-quality urbanization in central cities, accelerating urbanization in medium and small cities and counties, implementing differentiated FT subsidy standards, and promoting new agricultural scale management models. Full article

With increases in urbanization, agricultural production space is facing a series of problems, such as limited spatial development, loss of development entities, and difficulties in transformation, posing a huge challenge to national food security and sustainable rural development. The peasant household, as the main body in agricultural production space, plays a key role in solving human–land conflicts and achieving revitalization. In this article, we analyze the evolution characteristics of agricultural production space under the influence of peasant household behavior in the Yanhe River Basin from 1995 to 2018, and construct a spatial control system for agricultural production based on peasant household behavior guidance. Our conclusions are: (1) the agricultural production space in the Yanhe River Basin presents three major evolutionary characteristics, namely a reduction in spatial scale, a shift in the center of gravity of spatial distribution to the downstream, and a transformation of the spatial form from fragmented to regular; (2) the production input and production management behaviors of peasant households dominate the evolution of agricultural production space, while resource utilization behavior is an indirect influencing factor; moreover, peasant household behaviors are also influenced by conditions such as soil and location in agricultural production space; and (3) a control method system of “management and control basis + management and control implementation + management and control guarantee” has been formed through research, and targeted guidance has been given to peasant household behavior based on three levels of agricultural production zones and four types of rural areas. The research on zoning classification results can provide scientific guidance for the precise management of agricultural production space in the Yanhe River Basin, and the management and control method system can also provide a theoretical reference for the sustainable development path of agricultural production space. Full article