The Environmental Effect Of Chemical Fertilizer Input In Yangtze River Delta: An Economic Analysis Studies

In the process of building a socialist harmonious society, economic development and environmental harmony is one of the main themes in China's social development. Agricultural environment is also a very important issue in building the New Socialist Countryside Construction. As we know, agricultural development is inseparable from chemical fertilizers, pesticides and other factors of inputs, but if such inputs become burdens of sustainable agricultural development, then to constrain the input of agricultural production within a rational range is very urgent.Intensive cultivation often uses instant fertilizer frequently. If the time of rainfall and fertilization couples, farmland nitrogen will trigger lot phosphorus, runoff loss will happen, resulting in soil and waters of the nitrogen enrichment, which we called non-point source pollution. Developed regions in China will face more complicated agricultural non-point source pollution problems. The uncertain and hard-to-quantify features of nitrogen and phosphorus will increase the difficulty of monitoring the pollution.Despite a number of researches have explored the treatment methods to agricultural non-point source pollution, most of the studies are from the perspective of environmental studies. Unfortunately, there are few researches which from the economics point of view to analysis the very important controllable factors-fertilizer inputs of the agricultural. Especially in current circumstances that the fertilizer input is unreasonable aggravating, to explain the incentives of fertilizer over-investment, and to choose an effective method to restraint the over-investment is particularly urgent.External farmers' market failure is the cause of excessive fertilizer inputs. On this basis, this study profound analysis the deep-seated reasons of the excessive fertilizer inputs in Yangtze River delta, accounting the external environmental costs of chemical fertilizer, then give the reasonable policy recommendations on controlling the non-point source pollution by excessive chemical fertilizers. Being based on the existing researches, this study targeted at the Yangtze River Delta region whose economy is prosperity and agricultural non-point source pollution is serious. There are six main parts in this research. The main contents include: the excessive fertilizer inputs status of Yangtze River Delta region, the reasons for environmental problems and their methods of governance.Partâ… , chapter two, the theoretical foundation of this article is given by the the first part. From the point of rational economic assumptions, this part described the market mechanism in dealing with the issue of external defects in theory, and then proposed that the key point of changing the situation of external market failure is to include the environmental and social costs into the value of agricultural production target function.Partâ…¡, chapter three, It descrips the excessive fertilizer inputs status from the perspective of strength and density of the fertilizer input from 1980 to 2005 in Yangtze River Delta region.Partâ…¢, chapter four, from the perspective of improving labour productivity, it analysis the substitute rate of other elements which can replace fertilizer elements, the marginal production of chemical fertilizers, the marginal factor income of chemical fertilizers, as well as the contribution to agricultural production value of fertilizer input on the Yangtze River Delta fanning. Through the above analysis, it can explain the reason of the economic incentives by farmers who tent to choose the fertilizer production technology instate of other elements technology. It point out that under the condition of pursuit of agricultural revenue maximization, if there is no restraint technical system to the fertilizers input, the excessive fertilizer inputs situation will continue.Partâ…£, chapter five, theoretical analysis the way to bound farmers' fertilizer inputs through change the external conditions in farmers choose process. The key point is to change the current cost of agricultural production revenue function, include the marginal social costs into the function to maximize the agricultural income. Then take the example of Taihu Lake; it calculated the environmental damage by excess nitrogen fertilizer use in Taihu Lake area for rice production by environmental impact assessment methods. It is proved that the current excessive use of fertilizers is the result of underestimated the cost of agricultural production. At the present, the objective function of agricultural production inputs hasn't included the environmental costs into agricultural production function. At this stage, it should be a new awareness of the agricultural production function. It should change the agricultural cost function to maximize economic efficiency into an agricultural cost function to maximize environment and economic efficiency objectives as a fundamental solution.Partâ…¤, chapter six, empirical analysis the effects of socio-economic factors on the environmental effects of fertilizer inputs. The impact of the four most important factors has been tested in this part, which are Yangtze River Delta region's economic development level, the agricultural structure and agricultural markets, the integrity and stability of the right of land. Empirical analysis of the results show that the level of economic development forward in promoting the formation of fertilizer environmental issues, farmers use fertilizers to substitute the high cost of alternative elements such as the land and labor, which will increase the possibility of environmental pollution, because the adjustment of agricultural structure direction is to gradually reduce the traditional grain, cotton, oil products, increase the cultivation of cash crops, which will lead to more non-point source pollution occurred, the integrity and stability of the land revenue will ensure the farmers long-term investment incentive on the land, farmers will increase green manure and organic fertilizer inputs, appropriate to reduce the production of chemical fertilizers such short-term investment, give more attention to the restoration and protection of soil quality, these all will reduce fertilizer environmental issues formed, agricultural technological progress may not be a reduction of fertilizer environmental issues, If the use of agricultural machinery can increase fertilizer efficiency, then the role is existed, and because the agricultural plastic film technology can shorten the development cycle crop production, it is likely to increase the amount of fertilizer.Partâ…¥, chapter seven, policy suggestion of controlling fertilizer inputs based on former analysis. First of all, to change the agricultural production of cost-benefit accounting system fundamentally, the external environmental Fertilizer inputs costs should be take into agricultural cost accounting. At the same time, some related socio-economic policies can not be ignored. Accelerate the development of the rural economy and improving their environmental awareness can reduce the occurrence of fertilizers environmental pollution problems. Reasonable adjustment of agricultural structure must be guaranteed, and some areas need to implement restrictions on agricultural crop rotation. Reform the existing system and the promotion of agricultural land system so that the soil testing, fertilizer, and other important agricultural technical means to better promote the development of the rural households and more acceptable.