Study About The Farmer Behavior On The Dryland In The Western Arid Regions

Agricultural production of dry land related to our country's food security, dry lands account for 60% of arable land. Country's northern region concentrated with 85% of the total dry lands, and it is important for the national economy and the country's strategic agricultural growth. Northwest arid areas basically depend on natural precipitation, water shortage has seriously affected the farmers practices. The decision of farmers to plant dry land is a two-stage decision-making behavior:They first have to decide whether to plant dry land, and then decide what kind of crops planted in the dry lands. It is essential to find effective ways to raise the enthusiasm of farmers planting and reasonable arrangements for dry land crop structure. However, very few people study dry land farming practice from the perspective of water shortages.Based on the above background, the paper chose the Minle county, Zhangye city, Gansu Province as the study area which is famous for its serious water shortage. The paper analysis the factor which infect the farmer's decision, study the decision whether to plant dry land and how to find reasonable crops planted in the dry lands. Finally make effective policy recommendations.Paper is divided into five chapters:Chapter One is the introduction, first introduced the research background and the problem, and then explained the purpose and significance of the study, research methods and techniques routes; second chapter focuses on the important theoretical foundation and the relevant literature. Theory is based primarily on farmers" risk investment Behavior. Literature including the risk of water, farmers' risk preferences, farmers' investment decision-making behavior and factors such as content; third chapter first reviews the natural conditions of agricultural production in Minle county, Zhangye city of Gansu Province. and finally make a brief description of the study region. Chapter IV first make research hypothesis according to our predecessors. then introduces the model selection and variable definitions, analyze the expected impact of the variable results, and then use binary choice of Probit model and the multi-ranking selection of Ordered probit model to analyze farmer's decision about dry land. Analysis shows that non-farm income, land ownership, the per capita arable land area are both significant in the two models. Soil fertility is only significant to the initial decision-making to farmers, land quantity, machinery values, household culture and age,area classification variables is significant on the choose of dry land crops. Chapter V summarizes and puts forward some policy recommendations.