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Purpose: Agricultural technical education is widely used in Chinese agricultural production to reduce farmers' pesticide overuse. However, the effectiveness of technical education is questioned by scholars who found that it fails to promote farmers' pesticide management. In this study, we aimed to explore whether farmers' interpersonal trust in education staff affects the efficiency of technical education. Design/methodology/approach: A questionnaire-based cross-sectional study was conducted on Chinese vegetable farmers with 117 open field vegetable growers and 119 greenhouse vegetable growers. Data were analyzed using a multivariate regression model. Findings: The results show that technical education can significantly reduce farmers' pesticide application in vegetable production. And the effect of specific guidance is stronger than that of course training. The response of farmers on technical education, as a proxy of farmers' understanding capacity on education knowledge, negatively affects farmers' pesticide costs. More importantly, we find that farmers' trust in education staff could affect the positive effect of agricultural technical education on pesticide application. Practical implications: This study will enable education staff/officers to value interpersonal relationships, which can instruct farmers to turn the pesticide knowledge they received from technical education into production practice. Theoretical implications Promoting farmers' trust in information providers will increase the efficiency and quality of knowledge transmission and transformation in agricultural technical education. Originality/value: This paper highlights the importance of interpersonal trust in agricultural technical education, and offers an available explanation for controversy over on efficiency of agricultural technical education.

Purpose: This paper explores the information sharing between farmers clustered around a formal plant health information source, using six case studies of plant clinics in China and Zambia. Design/methodology/approach: A survey was carried out with 327 farmers; six plant doctors were interviewed and plant clinic records reviewed. Data were analysed using social network analysis and descriptive statistics. Findings: Clinic attendees shared plant health information with an average of 4.6 other farmers in China and 3.8 farmers in Zambia. However, the effective secondary reach of plant clinics, i.e. clinic attendees sharing information with non-attendees, was considerably lower, especially in China, where most sharing took place among clinic attendees. The Zambian plant clinics, managed by public extension services, show a more open pattern where information is also shared with non-attendees. Practical implications: Plant doctors could play a more proactive role in bridging formal and informal networks to enhance the diffusion of plant health information within farming communities. Strategies to optimize the secondary reach of plant clinics should be informed by the agro-ecological and socio-economic context, as well as the type of organization operating the service. Theoretical implications: The type of production system (degree of market orientation) and clinic's institutional setup (private vs. public sector) determine the characteristics of the social network around it. The closed, crop-specific networks in China result in high uptake of advice but limited secondary reach. The open, more crop-diverse networks in Zambia have higher secondary reach but lower uptake. Originality/value: This is the first study examining how information travels within social networks linked to plant clinics, and patterns of information sharing and use.

The Food Safety Knowledge Network (FSKN) is a collaboration between Michigan State University, the Global Food Safety Initiative of the Consumer Goods Forum, and other food industry and public sector partners. FSKN's goal is to help strengthen the food industry's response to the complex food safety knowledge and training challenges that affect emerging markets by providing free access to high-quality, standardized learning resources. The resources were designed to be available on demand and as a structured learning experience which can support face-to-face training and fully online training. The pilots thus far have shown that participants in FSKN training demonstrate a significant increase in knowledge. The paper will share the processes used to set up an efficient open educational resources initiative including understanding licensing, using open software, establishing competencies and working with corporate and other international partners. (Contains 2 figures.)

Not all commodities are things, nor are all things available in society commodities. Then, what are commodities? Using the case of rapeseed and its products in China, this paper examines the role of grades and standards (G&S) in simultaneously determining the life of things as commodities and the position of humans as market participants. In the first section, we summarize our conceptual understandings of commodities. Next, the paper examines tests and trials to which rapeseed in China were subjected by the mid 1990s. We then discuss how G&S represent political processes among commodity chain actors for creating, legitimizing and maintaining the social relations between things and people. Lastly, we discuss our conclusion that the analysis of tests and trials helps us understand the process of commodification as simultaneous transformations of humans and things in a commodity chain while reorganizing linkages among these actors. (Contains 1 figure and 6 footnotes.)

The past four decades have witnessed unprecedented economic growth and rapidly rising food demand in China. This paper provides an introduction to readers with useful information summarising the development of China's agricultural sector and the transformation of its rural economy over the 40 years of economic reform. It is, however, impossible to cover all aspects of this recent and rich history in a single journal special issue. Nevertheless, we are of the view that these papers address the most fundamentally important and insightful topics including: land reform and rural development; technology progress and productivity growth; changing food consumption patterns; rural education and human capital accumulation; and poverty alleviation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the transition from a national focus on food security during the last half of the 20th century to an emerging strategy on helping small-scale farm households increase farm income to reduce rural poverty. The basic proposition is that if extension is going to help increase farm incomes and rural employment, then it must shift from being a "supply-driven" to a more "market-driven" extension system. This shift requires at least three major institutional changes. First, extension must give higher priority to high-value, labor-intensive crops/products where there is real demand in domestic and/or export markets. Second, small-scale producers must get organized into groups to achieve economies of scale and to become linked with the "value chains" that supply these markets. Third, extension planning and decision-making must become decentralized to determine the most suitable crops and/or enterprises vis-a-vis the interests and resources of different farmer groups, in light of agro-ecological conditions and available markets for different products.

Rainfall fluctuations are the major threats caused by climate change. This paper analyses the impact of seasonal rainfall fluctuations on rural poverty using panel data for 992 counties, which are located in humid zone in the south of China from 2000 to 2018. The findings are as follows: (1) Rainfall fluctuations significantly affect rural poverty, specifically, increased rainfall significantly alleviates rural poverty in the dry season, but aggravates rural poverty in the rainy season. (2) The effect of rainfall fluctuations on rural poverty is significantly heterogeneous in different regions. (3) Rainfall fluctuations put low‐income areas at greater risk of returning to poverty. (4) The mechanism through which rainfall fluctuations affect rural poverty is agricultural production, and market regulation can mitigate the shock of rainfall fluctuations. Our research provides policy implications for developing countries to address the risks of poverty from climate change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

COVID-19 has caused major disruptions to agricultural supply chains around the world. Researchers and policy-makers are interested in identifying means to reduce the disruptive effects caused by the pandemic. We investigate the impacts of COVID-19 on the operation of e-commerce stores (in short, e-stores) specialising in agricultural inputs. The difference-in-differences method (DID) is employed to estimate the causal relationship between COVID-19 and online sales of agricultural inputs using data from 54,244 agricultural input e-stores registered in 118 prefecture-level cities across 15 provinces and hosted on two major Chinese e-commerce platforms. The results show that COVID-19 led to a substantial growth in monthly sales of agricultural input e-stores, and this growth of online sales varied across store scales and by types of agricultural inputs. In particular, e-stores selling seeds and seedlings experienced a larger growth in sales than stores selling agricultural machinery and implements, and the mid-and larger-scaled e-stores experienced more growth of sales than micro-and small-scaled e-stores. Further analysis reveals that the growth of online sales of agricultural inputs was driven mainly by an increase in the quantity of customer orders (QCO). The findings of this paper underscore the importance of e-commerce in ensuring the resilience of the agricultural supply chain during the pandemic period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we introduced the historical process and internal logic of China's rural land system reform and analyzed the successful experience of land reform in Dongling village. The results show that the long-term stability of land contracting right makes the ownership be virtualized, and the legalization of the land transfer lays the foundation for the diversification of the rural management subjects. The clear property rights enable them to allocate labour and capital freely, obtain economic benefits and then promote the development of rural industries. Land moderate-scale management is a dynamic and differentiated concept. All management subjects can achieve their ideal moderate scale of operation through land circulation. The experience of Dongling village shows that the land transfer should rely on the industry, and the key to the success or failure of the reform is that the industry should be sustainable, the distribution should be reasonable, the management should be scientific, and the supervision should be adequate. Of course, for developing countries, we need to formulate reform plans based on the differences in resource endowment instead of pursuing "fixed models" and "one-size-fits-all policy". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Maintaining crop outputs to feed its large population with limited resources while simultaneously mitigating carbon emissions are great challenges for China. Improving the efficiency of resource use in crop production is important in reducing carbon emissions. This paper constructs a methodological framework combining emergy-based indicator accounting and a nonseparable undesirable output slack-based measurement (SBM) data envelopment analysis (DEA) model. This framework is used to explore the efficiency of inputs and outputs and the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reduction potential for crop production systems, using Zhejiang province, China, as a case study. It is found that an emergy synthesis and a nonseparable undesirable output SBM-DEA framework is compatible with the case study. Crop production in Zhejiang province has relied heavily on an increase in agrochemical inputs to maintain agricultural output. Energy and chemical fertilizer use are determined as the province’s major carbon emissions sources. Although carbon emissions per unit of monetary output has decreased sharply, the carbon emissions per unit emergy output has increased, demonstrating a high carbon intensity reality. The DEA highlighted the differences in crop production efficiency, resource factor redundancy and carbon mitigation potential in the different prefectures of the province. To conclude this research, policies to support low carbon agriculture development, including subsidizing low carbon agriculture technology development and expansion and the cancellation of subsidies to high carbon production factors, such as chemical fertilizer production and sales, are discussed to conclude the research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The quest to eradicate poverty, central to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), poses a significant global challenge. Advancement in sustainable rural development is critical to this effort, requiring the seamless integration of environmental, economic, and governmental elements. Previous research often omits the complex interactions among these factors. Addressing this gap, this study evaluates sustainable rural development in China by examining the interconnection between agricultural production and government-led poverty reduction, with annual rainfall considered an influential factor of climate change impacts on these sectors and overall sustainability. Utilizing a Meta-frontier entropy network dynamic Directional Distance Function (DDF) within an exogenous Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) model, we categorize China's 27 provinces into southern and northern regions according to the Qinling-Huaihe line for a comparative study of environmental, economic, and governmental efficiency. This innovative approach overcomes the limitations of previous static analyses. The findings reveal: (1) Rainfall, as an exogenous variable, significantly affects agricultural production efficiency. (2) The overall efficiency in both southern and northern regions increases when accounting for rainfall. (3) Government effectiveness in poverty reduction is comparatively lower in the northern region than in the southern region when rainfall is considered. These insights underscore the importance of including climatic variables in sustainable development policies and emphasize the need for region-specific strategies to bolster resilience against climatic challenges. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using China's National Cooperative Medical Scheme (NCMS), a heavily subsided public medical insurance (PMI) scheme, aiming at covering all rural populations in China, as a quasi-natural experiment, we find that PMI unleashes entrepreneurship in the rural economy. This finding provides supporting evidence for Arrow's risk-shifting theory and enriches the literature on the effect of PMI that has focused mainly on health impact and consumption smoothing. We also demonstrate that PMI increases entrepreneurial investments primarily through the channel of wealth effect resulting from reduced out-of-pocket medical expenses. Besides, the entrepreneurship cultivation effect of PMI is more pronounced among rural households that are wealthier, have fuller insurance coverage, or have younger heads. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the situation of women left behind in villages when men out-migrate for work and what it implies for gender relations in rural China. It is based on questionnaire survey data that covers 400 left-behind women and extensive interviews in 10 rural communities. It reveals how the women take on multiple family responsibilities including mainly family care and agricultural production, and how they maintain their marital relationships in the context of a long separation. The discussion argues that even though the women's unpaid work becomes visible due to the absence of men in family life, there is a reaffirmation and reinforcement of gender traditions; women are more solidified in the unpaid and low-paid field of work in this new era of rural social transition in China. Moreover, separated married life has made women more vulnerable. In the end, it points to the fact that rural women are experiencing a new and deeper form of exploitation of their labour. Thus they are among those paying a heavy price for the development in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We elaborate on the features of the impact of smart farms (technologies), used for the improvement of product quality, on the UN SDGs that are connected with food security and sustainable development of the agrarian sector. The presented specifics of the implementation of smart technologies are considered in the context of the creation of farms, which structure and organisation are based on innovative digital, genetic and process solutions (experience of China) and in the context of the use of certain optimisation solutions (experience of other leading countries in the sphere of agriculture). We show the necessity to solve the problems of product quality through the implementation of technologies that can oppose climate change and are aimed at environmental protection. The methods used in this work include the method of complex analysis, statistical method and method of classification. The scientific novelty of this research lies in the identification of the modern characteristics of the influence of smart farms (technologies), used for the increase in product quality, on the social and economic Sustainable Development Goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The conversion of farmland to forestland not only changes the ecological environment but also enriches the soil with organic matter and affects the global carbon cycle. This paper reviews the influence of land use changes on the soil organic carbon sink to determine whether the Chinese “Grain-for-Green” (conversion of farmland to forestland) project increased the rate of SOC content during its implementation between 1999 and 2010 in the hilly and gully areas of the Loess Plateau in north-central China. The carbon sink was quantified, and the effects of the main species were assessed. The carbon sink increased from 2.26×106 kg in 1999 to 8.32×106 kg in 2010 with the sustainable growth of the converted areas. The black locust (Robinia pseudoacacia L.) and alfalfa (Medicago sativa L.) soil increased SOC content in the top soil (0–100 cm) in the initial 7-yr period, while the sequestration occurred later (>7 yr) in the 100–120 cm layer after the “Grain-for-Green” project was implemented. The carbon sink function measured for the afforested land provides evidence that the Grain-for-Green project has successfully excavated the carbon sink potential of the Shaanxi province and served as an important milestone for establishing an effective organic carbon management program. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Agricultural production depends on local agroclimatic conditions to a great extent, affected by ENSO and other ocean-atmospheric climate modes. This paper analyzed the spatio-temporal distributions of climate elements in the Jianghan Plain (JHP), Central China, and explored the impacts from teleconnection patterns, aimed at providing references for dealing with climate change and guiding agricultural activities. Both linear and multifactorial regression models were constructed based on the frequentist quantile regression and Bayesian quantile regression method, with the daily meteorological data sets of 17 national stations in the plain and teleconnection climate characteristic indices. The results showed that precipitation in JHP had stronger spatial variability than evapotranspiration. El Niño probably induced less precipitation in summer while the weakening Arctic Oscillation might lead to more summertime precipitation. The Nash-Sutcliffe efficiency (NSE) of the multifactorial and linear regression model at the median level were 0.42–0.56 and 0.12–0.18, respectively. The mean relative error (MRE) ranged −2.95–−0.26% and −7.83–0.94%, respectively, indicating the much better fitting accuracy of the multiple climatic factors model. Meanwhile it confirmed that the agricultural climate in JHP was under the influence from multiple teleconnection patterns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An agricultural production function is estimated using a Chinese county-level dataset along with associated geographic information. County-specific output-input elasticities are computed using the geographically weighted regression (GWR) and mapped with the geographical information system (GIS). A comparison of the ordinary least squares and GWR estimates confirms that allowing spatial variation in the parameters improves model fit of the agricultural production function, and provides valuable insights into the relative importance of inputs in different regions. Moran's indices reveal the spatial dependence of output per unit of land, and four inputs across regions. Mappings of GWR estimates help to detect a few clusters of high output-input elasticities: for labour in the Northeast, North, Southwest and Northwest China, for land in the Central and Southwest, for mechanical power in the North, Northwest and coastal area of the East and South and for fertiliser in the East. The county-specific scale elasticities suggest constant return to scale is likely to hold in the Central, East, Southwest and South. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The overall aim of the present paper is to better understand the evolution of tubewell ownership in the North China Plain, especially focusing on the factors that determine ownership and its effect on production. Based on a random sample of 30 villages in three counties in the Hai River Basin, our results show that collectively owned tubewells have been gradually privatised. The analyses demonstrate that increasing water and land scarcity and policy intervention (mainly fiscal and financial subsidies for tubewell investment) leads to the observed shifts in tubewell ownership patterns. The results also show that the privatisation of tubewells has affected cropping patterns in the North China Plain. When villages shift towards private tubewells, farmers move into more water-sensitive and high-value crops. Privatisation, however, has no negative effect on crop productivity in the present sample. Importantly, the evolution of tubewell ownership in the villages studied does not accelerate the fall of the groundwater table. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The cultural differences caused by rice cultivation between the north and south of China provide a unique perspective to study the local effect on corporate pro-environmental behavior. In this paper, we investigate the relationship between the geographical distribution of agricultural planting and corporate pro-environmental behavior. We manually collected the city-level rice planting data and used A-share listed companies' data from 2010 to 2019 in China and found that rice culture in the external environment in which the company is embedded has a positive association with the corporate reactive pro-environmental behavior, while rice culture in the internal values which CEO provided with is positively related to the corporate proactive pro-environmental behavior. Moreover, we find that environmental policy and migration are two moderators through which rice culture affects corporate pro-environmental behavior. This study not only sheds light on the agricultural drivers behind corporate pro-environmental behavior and extends the theoretical understanding of how cultural differences caused by geographical factors within countries influence corporate decisions but also helps firms, managers, and stakeholders effectively conduct self-reflection, management, and supervision on environmental issues through farming cultural dimensions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urbanization and land transfer have triggered a profound reform of the Chinese agricultural sector since reform and opening, leading to a continuous rise in agricultural carbon emissions. However, the impact of urbanization and land transfer on agricultural carbon emissions is not widely understood. Therefore, based on the panel data covering 30 provinces (cities) in China from 2005 to 2019, we adopted a panel autoregressive distributed lag model and a vector autoregressive model to empirically explore the causal relationship between land transfer, urbanization, and agricultural carbon emissions. The main conclusions are as follows: (1) Land transfer can significantly reduce carbon emissions from agricultural production in the long run, while urbanization has a positive effect on agricultural carbon emissions. (2) In the short run, land transfer has a significant positive impact on agricultural carbon emissions, and urbanization also has a positive impact on the carbon emissions of agricultural production, but in insignificant ways. (3) There is two-way causality between land transfer and agricultural carbon emission, and between urbanization and land transfer is the same, but urbanization is the one-way Granger cause of agricultural carbon emissions. Finally, some suggestions are provided for low-carbon agriculture development: the government should encourage the transfer of land management rights and guide high-quality resources to gather in green agriculture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The treatment of agricultural waste plays an important role in the sustainability of agricultural production and the well-being of rural communities. The present study analyzes the existing sources of agricultural waste in rural communities, their current disposal, and the farmers' attitudes towards waste management. The data is based on a survey in 21 communities in agricultural areas in Shaanxi (N = 359 farmers interviewed). The results provide a description of the main agricultural waste in the region based on empirical data. The responses highlight the farmers' experience, reputation, and engagement at recycling domestic waste as the main variables shaping their attitudes towards agricultural waste disposal. Farmers prefer treating primarily biowaste, mostly used for biogas generation or crop fertilizer at the farms. Improving waste management facilities, accessibility and economic incentives are identified as the main factors that could increase recycling rates, as well as the importance of training campaigns and instructions related to waste handling and recycling. The analysis captured the general trends in agricultural waste treatment and future directions and provides a basis for better designing waste and management alternatives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Straw return is an effective method for disposing agricultural residues. It not only utilizes agricultural waste but also improves soil. In the current review, different crop straw and its characteristics were highlighted, and patterns of straw return were explored (including straw return, straw biochar return, and their combined with fertilizer return), as well as their environmental impacts were outlined. In addition, the effects of straw return and straw biochar amendment on soil properties [e.g., pH, soil organic carbon (SOC), soil nitrogen (N)/phosphorus (P)/potassium (K), soil enzyme activities, and soil microbes] were discussed. Information collected from this review proposed that straw return and straw biochar return or in combination with fertilizer is an applicable way for improving soil fertility and enhancing crop production. Straw return is beneficial to soil physicochemical properties and soil microbial features. The rice straw has positive impacts on crop growth. However, there are different climate types, soil types and crops in China, meaning that the future research need long-term experiment to assess the complex interactions among straw, soil, and plant eco-systems. Accordingly, this review aims to provide available information on the application of straw return in terms of different patterns of its to justify and to expand their effective promotion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the spillover effects of China's New Rural Pension Scheme (NRPS) implemented in 2009 as a cash transfer program for agricultural production. Based on the data collected by the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Survey (CHARLS) in four periods (2011, 2013, 2015 and 2018), we employ Seemingly Unrelated Regression to explore how China's NRPS affects agricultural production. Our findings show that NRPS pensions reduce household operating areas by 1.99 mu and agricultural investment by 1150 yuan, while increasing the labor time of their own agricultural production by 168 h, and farmers in the payment period have a similar impact. This finding is still reliable after a series of robustness tests. Gender heterogeneity analysis indicates that male participation in NRPS is more likely to reduce the actual operating area and increase the labor input of the family, while female participation in NRPS is more likely to reduce the agricultural capital input of the family. Moreover, the in-depth study of agricultural performance shows that the implementation of NRPS helps increase the average output value per mu by 700 yuan and technical efficiency by 0.2%, although this is at the cost of declining labor productivity. This study links the joint decision-making of agricultural production factor inputs with pension schemes and contributes to the development of relevant research, which may provide policy implications for how cash transfer schemes affect agricultural production and agricultural performance in other countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Agricultural producer cooperatives are of great significance to the development of agricultural productivity and can provide improved economic welfare benefits to farmers. However, such organizations have not been well-developed in China. While China's new Cooperatives Law of 2007 has generated interest among scholars, very few empirical analyses have focused on the role of cooperatives in China's agricultural sector. The main objective of this study is to investigate the determinants of farmers' perception and their decision to participate in cooperatives, using a unique dataset from recently collected survey data of farming households in China's Jilin Province. The empirical results from probit and logit regression models suggest that educational attainment, risk comfort level, farm expansion, operational costs, geographic location and crop types are significant factors that influence producers' perception of cooperatives, as well as their participation behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How to satisfy food production sustainably in the rapid urbanizing process is a vital problem for major grain-producing areas. Taking two national grain-producing regions in China, Shandong and Dongting Lake Region as examples, this study uses step-by-step prediction and a double-objective linear programming model to analyze the dilemma of land scarcity, food demand, and environmental load. It is found that food demand by 2030 will induce partial regional cropland deficiency and heterogeneous agro-environmental risk among cities. The double-objective linear programming model finds possible solutions in different scenarios: on the premise of keeping the current cropland area unchanged, the upper threshold of crop yield by 2030 will be 2539.06 × 104 t in Dongting and 7175.13 × 104 t in Shandong, respectively. On the condition of guaranteeing food self-sufficiency and minimizing the environmental load, the lower threshold of arable land area should be 99.47 × 104 ha in Dongting and 436.85 × 104 ha in Shandong. Pollutant reduction will be realized by reallocation of agro-production task and optimized practices. The food carbon impact can be reduced by up to 1.27 kg CO2 eq/kg. This study contributes to feasible pathways towards adequate agro-production, lessened land scarcity, and minimal environmental risk for rapid urbanizing cities in a sustainable way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Vulnerability research is a new paradigm in the context of global environmental change and sustainable development. Taking vulnerability as a system's sensitivity to pressure and lack of adaptive capacity, this paper adopts territorial space as the research object and establishes a framework for assessing the vulnerability of territorial space from the viewpoint of ecological protection, agricultural production, and urban development as three major functional orientations. The framework consists of pressure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity assessment, as well as an index of 28 indicators, thus emphasizing the application of a comprehensive integration method for vulnerability assessment. Xingyang City, Henan Province, China was chosen as the study area, and the results showed that territorial space vulnerability on the basis of ecological protection, agricultural production, and urban development in 2018 was relatively stable, the identified vulnerable space constituting only about 12%, 9%, and 10%, respectively, of the total land in the study area. By analyzing the causes of the different levels of territorial space vulnerability, corresponding strategies for mitigating pressure, reducing sensitivity, and enhancing adaptive capacity were formulated. From the perspective of local governance, these strategies provide innovative analytical and technical methods for assessing the current status quo in spatial planning and for achieving sustainable development goals. Finally, we point out that research on territorial space vulnerability needs to gradually improve the conceptual framework and assessment indicator system, focus on further research on multiple scales and typical regions, and improve the guidance resulting from vulnerability research. • Carry out the research on the vulnerability of territory and space based on three functional orientations. • Deconstruct the territorial and spatial vulnerability from the pressure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity. • The territorial and spatial vulnerability on three functional orientations in Xingyang was relatively stable. • Innovative analytical and technical methods for assessing the current status quo in spatial planning were proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims to explore the dynamic association among crop production, livestock production, power consumption in agriculture, forest area, and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. Based on the annual data of China, spanning the period 1990 to 2016, the study applied the auto-regressive distributed lag (ARDL) bounds testing approach. In addition, the fully modified ordinary least squares (FMOLS) canonical cointegration regression (CCR) and the Granger causality tests are employed to check the robustness of the ARDL estimations. The ARDL-bounds testing approach indicated that all variables share a long-run connection. The long- and short-run ARDL estimations confirmed that crop production, as well as livestock production, has a significant positive effect on CO2 emissions in both cases. However, power consumption in agriculture and forest area has a negative effect on it, indicating that both variables reduce CO2 emissions in the long and short run. These results stood robust under various regression estimators and confirmed the findings of the ARDL method. Additionally, the results of the causality approach specified that a unidirectional causality is running from crop production, power consumption in agriculture, and forest area to CO2 emissions. The causality between livestock production and CO2 emissions is bidirectional. Therefore, the directions of this connection also validate the outcomes under various techniques used for robustness. These findings suggest that the government must reconsider its policies related to agricultural and livestock production and adopt environment-friendly practices in the agriculture sector that may reduce the carbon footprints in the long run. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the increase in industrial plants in the rural areas of developing countries, the effects of industrial air pollution on the technical efficiency of agricultural production have attracted considerable attention. However, although some studies have investigated the effects of air pollution on crops' yields, only few of them have focused on how industrial air pollution affects the relationships among production factors and their technical efficiency. Using survey data collected from southwestern China, this paper analyses the effects of point-source air pollution on rice production by incorporating air pollution as an input in a translog production function. Our findings indicate that industrial air pollution lowers the marginal products of factors, alters the relationships of labour-capital and chemical-capital from complementarity to substitution, and changes the seed-chemical relationship from substitution to complementarity. Furthermore, the complementary elasticities of labour-chemical and labour-seed are reduced, whereas that of capital-seed is improved. Without considering the changes in the production function, the technical efficiency estimated using the traditional stochastic frontier analysis method appears to be overestimated compared with that estimated using a modified measure. The understanding of the effects of industrial air pollution on technical efficiency will help researchers in making a sound estimation of agricultural loss and provide helpful insights for policy-makers. • Effect of air pollution on the technical efficiency of rice production was analysed; • Air pollution lowers the marginal products of production factors; • Air pollution alters the complementary or substitutional relationships among factors; • Air pollution changes the complementary elasticities of some factors; • A new measure considering pollution was used to estimate the technical efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Carbon dioxide emission and greenhouse gas emissions are considered core issue in the world that influence agricultural production and also cause climate change. The present study seeks to investigate the linkage of methane emissions, nitrous oxide emissions, carbon dioxide emission, and greenhouse gas emissions with agricultural gross domestic product in China. The long-term association was checked by using an autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) bounds testing approach, fully modified least squares method, and canonical cointegrating regression analysis. The results from long-run analysis exposed that carbon dioxide emission and greenhouse gas emissions have positive coefficients that demonstrate the long-run linkage with the agricultural gross domestic product having p values of 0.5709 and 0.3751, respectively. Similarly, results also revealed that agricultural methane emissions and agricultural nitrous oxide emissions have a negative association with the agricultural gross domestic product having p values of 0.1737 and 0.0559. China is a huge emitter of CO2 emission and greenhouse gas emissions. Possible conservative policies are required to form the Chinese government to tackle this challenge to decrease CO2 emission in order to increase agricultural production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Land consolidation (LC) is regarded as a useful tool to improve agricultural production. Measuring the effect of LC on agricultural production (ELCAP) is helpful for the planning of LC activities. In the past, it is difficult to measure ELCAP at regional level due to the lack of field observation, the change of crop planting structure, and high cost of sample collection. Satellite data have large coverage and high spatiotemporal resolution for vegetation observation, which can provide a new idea for estimating ELCAP at regional level. This study aims to build a novel assessment framework to quantitatively investigate ELCAP by developing several satellite‐based metrics. In addition, this study also explored the characteristics of ELCAP using the method of spatial autocorrelation and the geographical detector method in 1,281 LC areas in China. Our results show that agricultural productivity in more than 90% of total LC areas shows an increasing trend during 2001–2016. LC could play the positive but limited effects on agricultural production, and its productivity‐boosting effect (64.87% of total LC areas) is greater than its stability‐improving effect (46.53% of total LC areas). The spatial agglomeration of ELCAP is weak (Moran's I < 0.06), which may be resulted from the differences in field conditions and natural‐social–economic situations across LC areas. The interaction between several factors has a greater effect on the ELCAP than each of these factors. Methodology in this study provides a new and useful framework for evaluating ELCAP, and results can be used to guide the planning of LC activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

After a remarkable 86% increase in cereal production from 1980 to 2005, recent crop yield growth in China has been slow. County level crop production data between 1980 and 2010 from eastern and middle China were used to analyze spatial and temporal patterns of rice, wheat and maize yield in five major farming systems that include around 90% of China's cereal production. Site-specific yield trends were assessed in areas where those crops have experienced increasing yield or where yields have stagnated or declined. We find that rice yields have continued to increase on over 12.3 million hectares (m. ha) or 41.8% of the rice area in China between 1980 and 2010. However, yields stagnated on 50% of the rice area (around 14.7 m. ha) over this time period. Wheat yields increased on 13.8 m. ha (58.2% of the total harvest area), but stagnated on around 3.8 m. ha (15.8% of the harvest area). Yields increased on a smaller proportion of the maize area (17.7% of harvest area, 5.3 m. ha), while yields have stagnated on over 54% (16.3 m. ha). Many parts of the lowland rice and upland intensive sub-tropical farming systems were more prone to stagnation with rice, the upland intensive sub-tropical system with wheat, and maize in the temperate mixed system. Large areas where wheat yield continues to rise were found in the lowland rice and temperate mixed systems. Land and water constraints, climate variability, and other environmental limitations undermine increased crop yield and agricultural productivity in these systems and threaten future food security. Technology and policy innovations must be implemented to promote crop yields and the sustainable use of agricultural resources to maintain food security in China. In many production regions it is possible to better match the crop with input resources to raise crop yields and benefits. Investments may be especially useful to intensify production in areas where yields continue to improve. For example, increased support to maize production in southern China, where yields are still rising, seems justified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In China, Zou Zhe (Memorials to the Throne, or Palace Memorials), an official communication to the emperors of China by local officials, offers an opportunity to reconstruct the spatial-temporal distributions of droughts at a high-resolution. A 223-year, 1689–1911, time series of drought events was reconstructed in this study based on 2494 pieces of Zou Zhe. The results show that: 1) on the temporal scale, the drought affected areas, i.e., number of affected counties, showed three peak periods during the last 223 years and nine extreme drought years with more than 300 counties affected have been identified; 2) on the spatial scale, there existed three drought-prone areas in China, i.e., Gansu province and Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region in Northwest China, Shandong, Hebei, and Henan provinces and Tianjin in the North China, and Anhui and Jiangsu provinces in Jianghuai area, respectively; 3) the drought-prone areas have been expanding from North China to South China since the second half of 19th century; 4) on the seasonal scale, summer witnessed the largest number of drought events. Meanwhile, the uncertainties of the results were also discussed, i.e. what caused the spatial-temporal distribution of drought. The results of this study can be used to mitigate the adverse effects of extreme weather events on food increasing and stable production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given the growing challenges to food and eco-environmental security as well as sustainable development of animal husbandry in the farming and pastoral areas of northeast China, it is crucial to identify advantageous intercropping modes and some constraints limiting its popularization. In order to assess the performance of various intercropping modes of maize and alfalfa, a field experiment was conducted in a completely randomized block design with five treatments: maize monoculture in even rows, maize monoculture in alternating wide and narrow rows, alfalfa monoculture, maize intercropped with one row of alfalfa in wide rows and maize intercropped with two rows of alfalfa in wide rows. Results demonstrate that maize monoculture in alternating wide and narrow rows performed best for light transmission, grain yield and output value, compared to in even rows. When intercropped, maize intercropped with one row of alfalfa in wide rows was identified as the optimal strategy and the largely complementary ecological niches of alfalfa and maize were shown to account for the intercropping advantages, optimizing resource utilization and improving yield and economic incomes. These findings suggest that alfalfa/maize intercropping has obvious advantages over monoculture and is applicable to the farming and pastoral areas of northeast China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aimed to understand green finance's impact on fertilizer use and agricultural carbon emissions. We selected the macro panel data of 30 provinces (cities) in China from 2000 to 2019. The main research methods are standardized test framework (cross-sectional dependence, unit root and cointegration test), the latest causal test, impulse response, and variance decomposition analysis. Examined the long-term equilibrium relationship between green finance, fertilizer use, and agricultural carbon emissions. The results show: fertilizer consumption and agricultural carbon emissions have a positive correlation. However, green finance can significantly reduce agricultural carbon emissions. The causal test confirmed the bidirectional causal relationship between agricultural carbon emissions and fertilizer use. At the same time, verified one-way causality from green finance to both of them. Interpret the results of impulse response and variance decomposition analysis: among the changes in agricultural carbon emissions, chemical fertilizers contributed 2.45%, green finance contributed 4.34%. In addition, the contribution rate of green finance to chemical fertilizer changes reached 11.37%. Green finance will make a huge contribution to reducing fertilizer use and agricultural carbon emissions within a decade. The research conclusions provide an important scientific basis for China's provinces (cities) to formulate carbon emission reduction policies. China has initially formed a policy system and market environment to support the development of green finance, in 2020, the "dual carbon" goal was formally proposed. In 2021, the national "14th Five-Year Plan" and the 2035 Vision Goals emphasized the importance of green finance. It plays an important supporting role in carbon emission reduction goals, and green finance has become an important pillar of national strategic goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to identify the phosphorus species and concentration in animal manure, we comparatively characterized phosphorus in dairy manure, swine manure, and broiler litter, using a sequential procedure, a simplified two-step procedure (NaHCO3/NaOH+EDTA), and a solution Phosphorus-31 Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (31P-NMR) spectroscopy procedure. In the sequential procedure, deionized water extracted 39, 22, and 32%; NaHCO3 extracted 48, 26, and 37%; NaOH extracted 8, 9, and 13.8%; and HCl extracted 3, 42.8, and 17% of the total phosphorus in dairy manure, swine manure and broiler litter, respectively. Total phosphorus extracted by the NaHCO3/NaOH+EDTA procedure was 7.5, 32.4, and 15.8 g P kg−1 for dairy manure, swine manure, and broiler litter, respectively. The solution 31P-NMR procedure detected that 9, 34, and 29% of total phosphorus was phytic acid in dairy manure, swine manure, and broiler litter, respectively. These results show that phosphorus forms, availability, and quantities differ between animal manures, which provides valuable information for P characterization of animal manures in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climatic warming is often predicted to reduce wheat yield and grain quality in China. However, direct evidence is still lacking. We conducted a three-year experiment with a Free Air Temperature Increase (FATI) facility to examine the responses of winter wheat growth and plant N accumulation to a moderate temperature increase of 1.5°C predicted to prevail by 2050 in East China. Three warming treatments (AW: all-day warming; DW: daytime warming; NW: nighttime warming) were applied for an entire growth period. Consistent warming effects on wheat plant were recorded across the experimental years. An increase of ca. 1.5°C in daily, daytime and nighttime mean temperatures shortened the length of pre-anthesis period averagely by 12.7, 8.3 and 10.7 d (P<0.05), respectively, but had no significant impact on the length of the post-anthesis period. Warming did not significantly alter the aboveground biomass production, but the grain yield was 16.3, 18.1 and 19.6% (P<0.05) higher in the AW, DW and NW plots than the non-warmed plot, respectively. Warming also significantly increased plant N uptake and total biomass N accumulation. However, warming significantly reduced grain N concentrations while increased N concentrations in the leaves and stems. Together, our results demonstrate differential impacts of warming on the depositions of grain starch and protein, highlighting the needs to further understand the mechanisms that underlie warming impacts on plant C and N metabolism in wheat. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The composting industry has been growing rapidly in China because of a boom in the animal industry. Therefore, a rapid and accurate assessment of the quality of commercial organic fertilizers is of the utmost importance. In this study, a novel technique that combines near infrared (NIR) spectroscopy with partial least squares (PLS) analysis is developed for rapidly and accurately assessing commercial organic fertilizers quality. A total of 104 commercial organic fertilizers were collected from full-scale compost factories in Jiangsu Province, east China. In general, the NIR-PLS technique showed accurate predictions of the total organic matter, water soluble organic nitrogen, pH, and germination index; less accurate results of the moisture, total nitrogen, and electrical conductivity; and the least accurate results for water soluble organic carbon. Our results suggested the combined NIR-PLS technique could be applied as a valuable tool to rapidly and accurately assess the quality of commercial organic fertilizers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the isometric hypothesis, belowground plant biomass (MB) should scale isometrically with aboveground biomass (MA) and the scaling exponent should not vary with environmental factors. We tested this hypothesis using a large forest biomass database collected in China. Allometric scaling functions relating MB and MA were developed for the entire database and for different groups based on tree age, diameter at breast height, height, latitude, longitude or elevation. To investigate whether the scaling exponent is independent of these biotic and abiotic factors, we analyzed the relationship between the scaling exponent and these factors. Overall MB was significantly related to MA with a scaling exponent of 0.964. The scaling exponent of the allometric function did not vary with tree age, density, latitude, or longitude, but varied with diameter at breast height, height, and elevation. The mean of the scaling exponent over all groups was 0.986. Among 57 scaling relationships developed, 26 of the scaling exponents were not significantly different from 1. Our results generally support the isometric hypothesis. MB scaled near isometrically with MA and the scaling exponent did not vary with tree age, density, latitude, or longitude, but increased with tree size and elevation. While fitting a single allometric scaling relationship may be adequate, the estimation of MB from MA could be improved with size-specific scaling relationships. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The responses of litter decomposition to nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) additions were examined in an old-growth tropical forest in southern China to test the following hypotheses: (1) N addition would decrease litter decomposition; (2) P addition would increase litter decomposition, and (3) P addition would mitigate the inhibitive effect of N addition. Two kinds of leaf litter, Schima superba Chardn. & Champ. (S.S.) and Castanopsis chinensis Hance (C.C.), were studied using the litterbag technique. Four treatments were conducted at the following levels: control, N-addition (150 kg N ha−1 yr−1), P-addition (150 kg P ha−1 yr−1) and NP-addition (150 kg N ha−1 yr−1 plus 150 kg P ha−1 yr−1). While N addition significantly decreased the decomposition of both litters, P addition significantly inhibited decomposition of C.C., but did not affect the decomposition of S.S. The negative effect of N addition on litter decomposition might be related to the high N-saturation in this old-growth tropical forest; however, the negative effect of P addition might be due to the suppression of “microbial P mining”. Significant interaction between N and P addition was found on litter decomposition, which was reflected by the less negative effect in NP-addition plots than those in N-addition plots. Our results suggest that P addition may also have negative effect on litter decomposition and that P addition would mitigate the negative effect of N deposition on litter decomposition in tropical forests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Comprehensively understanding water consumption behavior is necessary to design efficient and effective water use strategies. Despite global efforts to identify the factors that affect domestic water consumption, those related to domestic water use in rural regions have not been sufficiently studied, particularly in villages that have gained access to improved water supply. To address this gap, we investigated 247 households in eight villages in the Wei River Basin where three types of improved water supply systems are implemented. Results show that domestic water consumption in liters per capita per day was significantly correlated with water supply pattern and vegetable garden area, and significantly negatively correlated with family size and age of household head. Traditional hygiene habits, use of water appliances, and preference for vegetable gardening remain dominant behaviors in the villages with access to improved water supply. Future studies on rural domestic water consumption should pay more attention to user lifestyles (water appliance usage habits, outdoor water use) and cultural backgrounds (age, education). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An understanding of the dynamics of soil organic carbon (SOC) as affected by farming practices is imperative for maintaining soil productivity and mitigating global warming. The objectives of this study were to investigate the effects of long-term fertilization on SOC and SOC fractions for the whole soil profile (0–100 cm) in northwest China. The study was initiated in 1979 in Gansu, China and included six treatments: unfertilized control (CK), nitrogen fertilizer (N), nitrogen and phosphorus (P) fertilizers (NP), straw plus N and P fertilizers (NP+S), farmyard manure (FYM), and farmyard manure plus N and P fertilizers (NP+FYM). Results showed that SOC concentration in the 0–20 cm soil layer increased with time except in the CK and N treatments. Long-term fertilization significantly influenced SOC concentrations and storage to 60 cm depth. Below 60 cm, SOC concentrations and storages were statistically not significant between all treatments. The concentration of SOC at different depths in 0–60 cm soil profile was higher under NP+FYM follow by under NP+S, compared to under CK. The SOC storage in 0–60 cm in NP+FYM, NP+S, FYM and NP treatments were increased by 41.3%, 32.9%, 28.1% and 17.9%, respectively, as compared to the CK treatment. Organic manure plus inorganic fertilizer application also increased labile soil organic carbon pools in 0–60 cm depth. The average concentration of particulate organic carbon (POC), dissolved organic carbon (DOC) and microbial biomass carbon (MBC) in organic manure plus inorganic fertilizer treatments (NP+S and NP+FYM) in 0–60 cm depth were increased by 64.9–91.9%, 42.5–56.9%, and 74.7–99.4%, respectively, over the CK treatment. The POC, MBC and DOC concentrations increased linearly with increasing SOC content. These results indicate that long-term additions of organic manure have the most beneficial effects in building carbon pools among the investigated types of fertilization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]