Rebalancing the Chinese Economy through Rural Development: How Much Does Land Consolidation Help?

This paper examines the role of land consolidation in contributing to the Chinese government’s objective of sustainable and balanced growth of the economy. Our review shows the current approach by the government suffers from major deficiencies: 1) historical legacy in land law amendment; 2) the reliance on rural encroachment for financing local fiscal income 3) deficiencies of land consolidation model.