Study On The Mechanism Of Farmers' Cultivated Land Abandonment Behavior In Hilly And Mountainous Area

Cultivated land abandonment is highly and frequently occurred in hilly and mountainous areas,and characterized by large quantity,wide area and long duration in recent years.Farmer is themicro-behavior body of cultivated land use,and the main stakeholders and participants of cultivated land use.To explore farmers' behavior mechanism of farmland abandonment is of great theoretical and practical significance for cultivated land protection and sustainable land use in Hilly and mountainous areas.It is believed that more than economic rationality which seeks maximize profits,farmers' cultivated land abandonment behavior is also motivated by sociological or psychological motives such as pursuing social recognition,and limited by subjective cognitive ability and objective conditions such as financial capability.Therefore,based on the Theory of Planned Behavior(TPB theory),following the transmission mechanism of “exogenous variables—cognitive judgment—intention choice— behavioral response”,this paper constructs a logical analysis framework based on TPB theory to study farmer' behavior mechanism of land abandonment,and verifies and empirically analyzes it based on the structural equation model and econometric models,including Probit,Tobit and quantile regression models.The main conclusions are as follows.1.The diagnosis shows that cultivated land abandonment in the case area is prominent in two forms: Dominant and recessive.According to the diagnosis of dominant cultivated land abandonment,the abandonment rates measured from abandoned households and abandoned area reached 36.69% and 17.50% respectively;according to the diagnosis of recessive abandonment,the recessive abandonment phenomena in the hilly and mountainous areas of Southern Jiangxi Province were characterized by the decrease of sowing area,the decrease of multiple cropping index,the periodic decrease of cultivated land revenue and intensity degree.2.The TPB logical analysis framework of “exogenous variables—cognitive judgment—intention choice—behavioral response” can reveal the behavioral mechanism of farmland abandonment comprehensively of farmers in hilly and mountainous areas.The discoveries are as follows.(1)Farmer cognition(namely,attitude towards behavior,subjective norm,perceived behavior control)on farmland abandonment determines their intention to abandon farmland thus determines the abandonment behavior;(2)the attitude toward behavior and subjective norm restrict farmers' abandonment behavior mainly through their internal consciousness and external public opinion from stakeholders,reflecting their non-economic rational motivation,such as sociological and psychological motives;(3)perceived behavioral control reflects the actual control conditions that promote or hinder farmers' abandonment behavior,reflecting farmers' economic rationality to a greater extent;(4)exogenous variables(including population characteristics,employment characteristics and environmental characteristics)influencing farmers' cognition affect farmers' abandonment behavior ultimately.3.The structural equation model is built to verify the scientific feasibility of TPB theory to reveal farmers' behavior mechanism of farmland abandonment.The results are as follows.(1)The path coefficients of attitude towards behavior,subjective norm and perceived behavior control to abandonment intention are 0.23,0.24 and 0.58 respectively,which are significant.The path coefficient of abandonment intention to abandonment behavior is 0.88 and significant,indicating that attitude towards behavior,subjective norm and perceived behavior control significantly affect farmers' abandonment intention,thus determine their abandonment behavior.(2)Among the three observable variables of attitude towards behavior,farmers' cognition on the environmental impact of farmland abandonment is higher than that on economic and social impact.(3)Among the three observable variables of subjective norm,government intervention in farmland abandonment is stronger than that of family members and villagers,but the influence of intervention from family members and villagers is greater than that from government.(4)Among the three observable variables of perceived behavior control,objective obstacle in cultivated land cultivation is the most important observable variable affecting farmers' cognition on perceived behavior control,followed by agricultural labor force and none-farm employment opportunities.4.Probit and Tobit models are constructed to empirically explore the behavioral mechanism of how exogenous variables affect farmers' dominant abandonment behavior through cognition.The research discoveries are as followings.(1)education level,the proportion of family agricultural labor force,the proportion of village agricultural labor force,the number of family party members,the quality of farmland,irrigation conditions and the transferred area et al.have significantly negative effect on dominant farmland abandonment;population structure,the proportion of labor income,cultivated land area,the number of plots and the commuting time have significantly positive effect on the dominant abandoned land.(2)The regression results of exogenous variables influencing abandonment behavior through perceived behavior control are more significant and stable,such as the proportion of labor income and cultivated land area.The regression results of exogenous variables influencing abandonment behavior through attitude toward behavior and subjective norm are less significant and stable,such as education level,proportion of rural labor force.5.Quantile regression model is built to empirically explore the behavioral mechanism of how exogenous variables affect farmers' recessive abandonment behavior through cognition.The results are as follows.(1)the influence of exogenous variables on recessive farmland abandonment is mainly manifested in the differential effect on different degrees of cultivated land intensification or multiple cropping index.(2)for the variables that have significant influence on the light,medium and severe recessive farmland abandonment,the influencing degree decreases with the deepening of abandonment.At last,policy recommendations are proposed according to the above conclusions,including adopting targeted management strategies to the abandoned cultivated land,increasing local non-agricultural employment opportunities for farmers,improving farmers' cognition on cultivated land abandonment,and creating the social atmosphere of protecting cultivated land etc.