Study On The Sustainable Development Of Urban Agriculture In Shanghai

Seen from the guarantee of the safety of food provision, the maintenance of social stability, the realization of the concerted and balanced development of urban and rural area, or from the fulfillment of the diversified cultural needs of the city dwellers, the improvement of the eco-environment of the city, the strengthening of the amenity of living of the city, the enhancement of city image, urban agriculture is an indispensable and basic industry for Shanghai, a metropolis. Since the urban agricultural practice in the mid-1990s, Shanghai's agriculture, under the reasonable direction, support of the government and pushed by the various urban demands, has gained on speed in its shift from suburb agriculture to urban agriculture. Urban agriculture has witnessed an exciting development, giving obvious support to the sustainable development of the regional economy. Nevertheless, with the rapid development of the regional economy and the full execution of the various social project, the urban agriculture in Shanghai has encountered a series of problems such as rapid shrink of the agriculture resources, high pressure on eco-environment of agriculture, lowering of the status of agricultural economy, lack of initiative in the management of agricultural production. Hence, the development of the urban agriculture in Shanghai has a long way to go. In this background, guided by the idea of sustainable development, an empirical study of the development of Shanghai's urban agriculture not only contributes to its sustainable, healthy, orderly, all-around development but also provides for the vigorous development of urban agriculture in China the experiences for reference.Based on a large amount of relevant materials such as statistic data, survey data, literature, and with the adoption of methods combining theoretical investigation and empirical study, qualitative analysis and quantitative evaluation, canonical analysis and surface analysis, comparative analysis and logic induction, and taking history, current situation, future and pressure, state, response as a logic thread, this dissertation studies on the sustainable development of Shanghai's urban agriculture.The development of any industry can not be completed instantly and has its inertia and historical continuity. Any isolated or static thinking about current situation will definitely have its shortcomings. Urban agriculture is a modern agriculture territorial type, one developed gradually from the embryonic and preparational stage and on the basis of rural and suburb agriculture. A review of the evolution of the economic status, industrial structure, production distribution, function of the agricultural and current character of urban agriculture in Shanghai from a historical angle of view shows the following results: since 1949 the total value of agriculture production has increased year on year, but its contribution rate to the economy and the income of the family has undergone a steady decline; the structure of agriculture industry has evolved from mainly planting in the rural stage to mainly planting and livestock husbandry in the suburb stage to mainly planting with equal emphasis on livestock husbandry and fishing in urban agriculture stage; the production distribution has evolved from simplicity to multiplicity; the function of agriculture industry has evolved from the produce of staple food such as grain, cotton and live pig in the rural stage to the provision of non-staple food in the suburb stage and to the gradual and sound realization of the multifunction of agriculture in the urban stage, thus ensuring the safety of agricultural by products and varied consumption of the city dwellers, satisfying the diversified social and cultural demands of urban and rural inhabitants, offering eco-protection for the city.The emergence of any new things has their motivations. In the rapid process from suburb agriculture to modern urban agriculture and in the sustainable development of urban agriculture, Shanghai's agriculture has been pushed ahead by the following factors: the increasingly relaxed control of the economic system and the reasonable guide of the policy of agriculture industry; the fast pace of urbanization and the harmonious relationship between the urban and rural area; the increase in the derivative functions of agriculture and in the agricultural level of science and technology; the steady development of agricultural industrialization and the vigorous construction of modern agricultural zone at various level and of various sort;Through quantitative comprehensive evaluation and analyse its result in this dissertation shows us the following conclusions: after ten years development, the sustainability of Shanghai's urban agriculture has been increased dramatically, with the previously fluctuating sustainability index increased from 0.4015 in 1998 to 0.5619 in 2006; the evaluation value of the sustainable development of subsystem of the population has a wave-like decrease, given the aging of Shanghai's labor, moonlighting, lack of agricultural skills, the influx of migrant workers into the Shanghai's agricultural sector, the slowness in the improvement of the culture quality of the agricultural labor, the subsystem of the population has become a major hindrance to improve the sustainability of urban agriculture; after the previous ups and downs and the continued and steady increase since 2000, the economic and social subsystem has become the major contributor to improve the sustainability of urban agriculture; the subsystem of resources has witnessed a marked decline, the shortage and steady decline in the resources of agricultural land has become a major restrictive factor to the development of urban agriculture; the evaluative value of the subsystem of environment has not increased by a large margin, with overuse of fertilizer and pesticide still having the negative impact on enhance the sustainability development of urban agriculture; the R-D comprehensive index is relatively small, the average being 1.9090 and still in a obvious decline, so the resources pressure on the urban agriculture is heavy and will be heavier; the E-D comprehensive index is small, staying at 1 and the environmental pressure on the sustainable development of urban industry is heavy, yet stable.At present, the sustainable development of Shanghai's urban agriculture has both its opportunities and challenges, with strong advantages and obvious shortcomings. Using the SWOT method for analysis, combining the results from the qualitative evaluation, this dissertation points out some urgent problems to be earnestly tackled: the weakening of the producing and managing agent of modern agriculture, lack of successors to the agriculture production; the relatively low efficiency of grain production and lack of initiative to grow grain on the part of farmers; slowness in the transfer of the rights of land management contract and the consequent slowness in the scale and industrialization of agriculture; the decrease in the arable resources and the narrowing scope for agriculture development; a severe pollution in agriculture production and a unpromising prospect for the eco-environment of agriculture.On the basis of the above study, this dissertation puts forward some suggestions for the development of Shanghai's urban agriculture in the near future from the following aspects: the overall objective and function orientation; the restructuring of agriculture industry, organization and direction for development; key sectors and fields for development; area redistribution and layout for the major sectors; the tentative suggestions for the solution of some prominent problems.