Rural Public Goods Supply In Shaanxi Of China

Shaanxi is a less developed province in China. The supply of rural public goods is one of the key factors that restrain its rural development. At present, the main problems with its rural public goods supply include insufficient total supply, low supply quality, unreasonable supply structure, non-supply-efficiency or low-supply-efficiency. The issues as what kinds of public goods should be supplied, how to supply and how the supply efficiency is matter greatly for governments of various levels especially the county and town governments. The solving of these problems does not only depend on the supply quality and quantity of rural public goods but also depends on governments'understanding and satisfying of farmers'real demand for rural public goods. Thus the effective supply of rural public goods is not only a problem within rural areas but also a matter for a balanced rural-urban development and the building of a well-off society. Because of the significance of this problem, it has become the focus of academic circle as well as the political circle. Based on rural public goods'significances mentioned above, this paper, studying from the perspectives of rural public goods'supply mode, supply efficiency and farming households'satisfaction degree, aims to answer the questions as who should offer rural public goods, how to offer and how is its offering effect in theory.The structure of this paper is as follows: First, the evolving process of Shaanxi rural public goods supply is elaborated. The whole process is composed of four stages namely Early Days of New China, the People's Commune Period, Pre-rural-tax-and-fee-reform Period and Post-rural-tax-and-fee-reform Period. At the same time, by using the data collected by a field investigation of the 102 villages in the middle part of Shaanxi area's 24 towns from July to August, 2007, the status quo of and the main problems with Shaanxi rural public goods supply are analyzed. Second, by using the methods of Co-Integration Analysis, Granger Causality Test and Multiple Regression Analysis, empirical analyses of the influence of rural public goods supply on rural economic development and the influencing degrees of different kinds of rural public goods supply are conducted. Third, by a fuzzy mathematics membership degree analysis of Shaanxi rural areas'statistical data from 1990 to 2008, Shaanxi rural areas'development stages are quantitatively concluded and the rural public goods supply mode which adapts to the current development stage of Shaanxi is put forward. Fourthly, from the perspective of farming households, using 1,156 data collected from a field investigation conducted in 25 counties in Shaanxi, from June to December, 2009, rural public goods supply satisfaction degrees are analyzed. At the same time, by comprehensive employment of Factor Analysis Method and Dualistic Discrete Choice Model, key factors that have an influence on Shaanxi rural public goods supply satisfaction degree are revealed. Fifthly, for effective and accurate assessment and comparison of different Shaanxi rural areas'rural public goods supply conditions, 11 cities'2007 and 2008 year rural public goods supply efficiencies (including comprehensive technology efficiency, pure technology efficiency and scale efficiency) are calculated by DEA method. At last, for the improvement of Shaanxi rural public goods supply, suggestions as optimizing supply environment, perfecting supply mechanism and transferring government's roles are made.The conclusions of this paper are as follows:Viewed nationally, health care and education should be prioritized. Viewed from Shaanxi, rural primary education, agriculture water engineering, rural road, power and communication system construction conditions all have dramatic positive effects on farmers'income increase and agriculture production. Besides, rural public goods supply has economies of scale effect on farmers'income increase and agriculture development.From 1990s till now, on the whole, Shaanxi rural areas are transforming from economic development growing stage to economic development maturity stage. In this period, pure public goods are demanded comparatively worse among farmers. This situation objectively requires that government is the main public goods supply body. Thus government-led rural public goods supply mode is the reasonable choice for this period.From farming household's perspective, rural public goods supply satisfaction degrees, from high to low, are in turns rural primary education, road, health care, agriculture water engineering, drinking water facilities, public sanitation, clean energy, culture and entertainment, agriculture extension and training. The order of farming household's expectation of government investment field coincides with that of individually collected funds'investment inclination. This order is rural road, health care, drinking water facilities, clean energy, agriculture extension and training, agriculture water engineering, primary education, public sanitation, culture and entertainment. Fundamental-type and secure-type public goods have very significant influence on farming household's satisfaction degree. Farming household's per capita income and clean energy have significant influence on farming household's satisfaction degree. Development-type public goods influence farming household's satisfaction degree to a smaller extent. Age, education level and number of family members can make influence on farming household's satisfaction degree, only to a slight extent. Gender makes no influence on farming household's satisfaction degree. The supply of public goods in Tongchuan, Baoji, Weinan, Yangling, Ankang, Shangluo, Yan'an and Yulin in 2007and 2008 are all EDA effective. The comprehensive technology efficiency level and scale efficiency level in northern and southern part of Shaanxi is higher than that in the middle part of Shaanxi in 2007. While the comprehensive technology efficiency level and scale efficiency level in northern and middle part of Shaanxi is higher than that in the southern part of Shaanxi in 2008. The differentiation of technology diffusion in southern part of Shaanxi is higher than that in northern and middle part of Shaanxi in 2007 and 2008.