Study On The Farmers’ Welfare Effect Of Sloping Land Conversion Program

The protection and improvement of ecological environment is related to the welfare of human beings and the sustainable development of social economy.Constructing ecological civilization for forest is a key to the restoration and protection of a good ecological environment,and Sloping Land Conversion Program(SLCP)is an important tool and gripper for China to achieve a good ecological environment.Ecological environment has the attribute of public goods,which is the most inclusive welfare of people’s livelihood.A good ecological environment is the basis for human survival and health,the prerequisite for the protection and development of productivity,and affects the improvement of human welfare and the development of social economy to a high quality.Faced with the increasingly severe situation of ecological degradation,resource depletion,soil erosion,land desertification,fertility decline and frequent disasters,the Chinese government began to pilot the implementation of the project in 1999.Conversion of cropland to forest is a public ecological project with the largest investment scale,the widest coverage,the strongest policy and the highest participation of farmers in China and even in the world.As a public policy,the implementation plan and principle of Sloping Land Conversion Program are " Sloping Land Conversion Program,closing mountains for afforestation,food for relief,individual contracting" and "who returns farmland,who afforestation,who management,who benefits".The investment of Sloping Land Conversion Program is the government’s use of public financial funds to carry out ecological construction,which has the function of transfer payment,but its implementation plan and principle are based on the private contract system.Farmers are the main supply body of Sloping Land Conversion Program,not the public organization,but the participation of Sloping Land Conversion Program by seeking private interests,which is helpful to promote the efficiency incentive of the supply of ecological public products.From the perspective of welfare economics,the improvement of farmers’ welfare is not only the precondition of ecological governance,but also the important goal of ecological governance.With the sustainable implementation of Sloping Land Conversion Program,the welfare goal of improving farmers’ livelihood given by the government is more prominent.From ecological priority,taking into account the goal of farmers’ production structure and rural economic structure adjustment,to the goal of promoting farmers to get rid of poverty and increase farmers’ income,we will further promote the construction of ecological civilization,sustainable development,poverty alleviation and development in concentrated areas We will increase the capacity of green agricultural production and the goal of poverty alleviation.It can be seen that improving the welfare of farmers has become an important goal of the policy.Then,in the context of sustainable implementation of the project,how the policy affects the welfare of farmers and how its effect is the key to evaluate the performance of the project,is also an important way to solve the " Agriculture,countryside,farmers " problem,and is also the practical evidence to optimize and improve the policy.Therefore,it has been more than 20 years since the implementation of the project.It is of great theoretical and practical significance to evaluate the welfare effect of the farmers in the project for improving the policy and achieving sustainable development.The mian conclusion are as follows:First,based on the analysis of the welfare status of the farmers in the conversion area,in the aspect of subjective welfare,the life satisfaction of the farmers in the conversion area is significantly improved.The number of households with satisfactory living conditions is higher than that of households without satisfactory living conditions,596 households and 402 households,respectively.The correlation coefficient between the average value of Sloping Land Conversion Program and the average life satisfaction of farmers is 0.0547,showing a positive correlation.The intercept of the trend line of the scatter plot is 1.5967,with a slight inclination to the upper right.In terms of objective welfare,first of all,the income level and growth rate of farmers in the sample population,the Yangtze River Basin,the Yellow River Basin,the eastern region,the central region and the western region have been increasing significantly,and the income source and structure have been diversified.Farmers have received more than agricultural subsidies,and their comparative advantages have been gradually declining.The subsidies for returning farmland have been inverted "U" shape,and the average annual return of farmers has been achieved The cultivated subsidy is RMB 360.73 yuan,and the agricultural subsidy(including grain subsidy,agricultural material subsidy,agricultural machinery subsidy and improved seed subsidy)is RMB 98.92 yuan.The subsidy for Sloping Land Conversion Program is nearly four times of the agricultural subsidy.Secondly,the change of poverty level in China is greatly influenced by the change of national poverty line standard.With the decrease of the number of poor people,the internal income distribution of farmers’ poverty is more unequal.The scope,depth and intensity of farmers’ poverty have declined from 1999 to 2006,and the scope of poverty has declined greatly.The scope and depth of farmers’ poverty have both declined from 2007 to 2014 It has an upward trend in the fluctuation.Finally,compared with the non conversion households,the labor utilization structure of the conversion households has been significantly adjusted.From 1999 to 2014,168 days of migrant workers,116 days of forestry,animal husbandry and fishery workers,100 days of farming workers,36 days of non-agricultural management workers,216 days of land-based workers,204 days of non-agricultural employment workers.Second,The ordered probit model was used to test the impact of the project on the subjective welfare effect of farmers’ life satisfaction.The results show that,in terms of the sample as a whole,the project can improve and improve the possibility of farmers’ life satisfaction.Specifically,if farmers participate in the conversion of farmland to forest,the probability of "dissatisfaction" and "general" will be reduced by 3.9% and 4.79% respectively,and the probability of "satisfaction" will be increased by 52.86%.In terms of different groups of poor households and non poor households,the project can not only promote the life satisfaction of poor households,but also promote the life satisfaction of non-agricultural poor households.Both poor households and non-poor households benefit from the implementation of the project,improving the subjective welfare level of the two groups,and the possibility of improving the life satisfaction of poor households is greater than that of non-poor households.In terms of different regions,there are obvious regional differences in the life satisfaction of farmers in different regions affected by the Sloping Land Conversion Program,which are in the order of western region,Yangtze River Basin,eastern region,central region and Yellow River Basin.Third,Using the psm-did model and the intermediary effect model,this paper explores the impact of the project on the objective welfare effect of farmers’ income growth.The results show that in terms of the sample as a whole,under the condition of controlling many decisive factors,the project promotes the short-term income growth and long-term income growth of farmers,with the ranges of 175 yuan and 148 yuan,respectively.Without considering the subsidy for the conversion of farmland,the income growth level of farmers decreases,but the long-term income growth can still be achieved;the participating variables for the Sloping Land Conversion Programt are decomposed into the year variables for the conversion of farmland After that,because the government in order to strengthen the results of Sloping Land Conversion Programt,and constantly issued relevant policies,the study found that the impact of conversion of cropland to forest on the income growth of farmers fluctuated in stages,and there were year differences in the income growth of farmers.In the investigation of the income growth sources and structure of the project,the project promotes the diversification of the income increase sources of the farmers.The income increase of the farmers is 38 yuan,the local increase is 20 yuan,and the foreign increase is 41 yuan,which makes a great contribution.After the project,the changes of the farmers’ management behavior are significant,and the adjustment of the production and management structure is obvious.The increase of the agricultural management is 15 yuan,of which the planting industry is 31 yuan and the forest industry is 31 yuan The income of animal husbandry and fishery was 12 yuan;the income of secondary and tertiary industries(non-agricultural operation)increased by 21 yuan.In terms of different regions,conversion of farmland to forest has increased the income of farmers in different regions,but there are significant regional differences.In the eastern region,the central region,the western region,the Yellow River Basin and the Yangtze River Basin,the increase of farmers’ income was 106 yuan,113 yuan,120 yuan,64 yuan and 76 yuan respectively.The production structure,employment structure and cultivated land productivity of the farmers play a significant intermediary role in increasing income and welfare of the farmers.Forth,Using the psm-did model and regression decomposition method,this paper explores the objective economic welfare impact of the project on the poverty alleviation of farmers,and establishes the target analysis index of the project.The results show that the poverty alleviation targeting effect of the project is not high.The targeting rate of the project is 44% from 1999 to 2014,and with the sustainable development of the project,the overall targeting rate of the project is gradually rising,reaching 59% of that in 2008;the corresponding leakage rate of the project is 56% on the whole,and with the progress of the project,the leakage rate is declining;the effective coverage rate of the project is 8%.There are significant year and regional differences in the poverty alleviation effect of the project.According to the national absolute poverty standard,the contribution rate of the poverty alleviation effect of returning farmland to forest was 1.18% from 1999 to 2014.In terms of the year of conversion,the second to the eighth year of conversion has the effect of poverty alleviation.In the same way,its contribution to poverty alleviation is small,and its effect of poverty alleviation is not significant.On the other hand,the first year and the ninth to the sixteenth year of conversion do not have the effect of poverty alleviation.In terms of the areas to be converted to farmland,the contribution to poverty alleviation under the national absolute poverty standard is the western region(11.32%),the Yellow River Basin(9.16%),the eastern region(6.41%),the Yangtze River Basin(4.17%)and the central region(1.23%).Finally,using panel data logit model and cluster fixed effect model to analyze the objective economic welfare impact of the project on non-agricultural employment of farmers.The results show that: farmers participate in the project of Sloping Land Conversion Program,the restriction of land to rural labor force is relaxed,the flow and transfer tendency of agricultural surplus labor force is faster,and the possibility of farmers’ non-agricultural employment,migrant work and non-agricultural employment participation is significantly increased.The Sloping Land Conversion Program has promoted the participation of non-agricultural employment,migrant workers and non-agricultural management labor,which significantly increased the possibility of 20.1%,15.7% and 4.4% compared with the non-agricultural households.Part of the agricultural labor time released by the project has promoted the supply of non-agricultural employment,migrant workers and non-agricultural management labor,among which migrant workers contribute a lot.From the second year to the seventh year,the promotion of non-agricultural employment,migrant workers and non-agricultural labor supply gradually increased,but in the following years,non-agricultural employment,migrant workers and non-agricultural labor supply gradually decreased,and gradually became less significant.The project promotes the non-agricultural employment,migrant work and non-agricultural employment time of farmers in different regions,but there are significant regional differences.