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Arable land consolidation potential (ALCP) evaluation is an ex ante evaluation, the purpose of which is to select areas that are suitable for land consolidation projects and to support the decision-making processes of the LC Bureau. In this paper, ALCP is divided into two types - theoretical and practical. Theoretical ALCP represents the potential that can be fulfilled from a natural standpoint and has five main categories: (1) increase in available arable land area; (2) increase in agricultural productivity; (3) decrease in agricultural production costs; (4) improvement in the ecological environment; and (5) decrease in land property disputes as a result of ALC. Practical ALCP represents the potential that can be achieved. The transformation from theoretical into practical ALCP is affected by factors such as existing technology and farmer support. Moreover, in this paper an evaluation system for both theoretical and practical ALCP is established, with all evaluation indices having values between 0 and 1. The ALCP for the Daxing district of Beijing is evaluated based on statistical and field survey data, using GIS analysis and a fuzzy synthetic evaluation model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a quantitative model for assessing the spatiotemporal patterns in the growth of grain production in China between 1985 and 2008 using provincial panel data and a GIS model. The results show that the pathway for grain production relied mainly on land productivity growth as a rational response to the scarcity of cultivated land and a small peasant-based economy. Large-scale land management is the inevitable trend for agricultural development in China. In Inner Mongolia and Heilongjiang, promoting labour productivity accords with the requirement for the transition of cultivated land management in the future. The area of cultivated land per agricultural employee (1.33 ha) may be the reference threshold for large-scale land management. Finally, suggestions for regulations against regional cultivated land management are proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]