Research On The Impacts Of Peasants' Professionalization And Immigration On Farmland Use Intensity

Human-land relationship and sustainable land use are important research fields for addressing population,resources and environmental development issues since the late 20th century.Within these fields,strengthening land-use intensity and improving land-use efficiency so as to properly balance economic development,food security and ecological environment problems,are also hot issues that governments and academic circles pay attention to.On the one hand,rapid industrialization and urbanization have led to the continuous migration of agricultural population,loss of rural population and agricultural land transformation,the problem of"who will do farm work?" raises with the trend of rural decay.On the other hand,in the process of the transformation from traditional agriculture to commericial agriculture,producers prefer to grow cash crops and show an exploitative land-use trend,"how to do farm work?"also becomes a question.Under the background of the increasing demand of residents for more diversified and higher-quality food,and policies of training new professional farmers and new urbanization construction,agricultural labor force develop in accelerated speed from traditional small-peasant to professional farmer in the agricultural sector,and transfer across the region along the gradient in spatial scale at the same time.Through promoting agricultural transformation,these changes will have a wide and far-reaching influence on rural land use.Domestic research on the intensive use of farmland mainly focuses on macro and meso scale,hence there is still a lack of research on microscales like farmer household and plots,let alone the impact of rural population differentiation,which is caused by agricultural labor factor mobility and promotion on human capital level,on farmland use distinction.Besides,the correlation researches are rarely involved in comprehensive effects of multi-level factors such as rural household,plots and villages under regional background conditions.Therefore,this paper studies the differentiation of peasants or farmers and its mechanism and effect on farmland use intensity,from the two path dimensions of peasant professionalization and peasant immigration,and explores the complexity and diversity between peasant households' own characteristics and extensive or intensive farmland utilizationThis study firstly analyzed the specific impact mechanism of peasant professionalization and immigration on farmland use intensity,and then tentatively constructed an index system to measure each factor.Secondly,taking Nanjing as the research area,this study obtained 320 valid samples of peasant households through field questionnaire surveys.After that,the professionalism level and immigration situation of peasants,and their farmland use intensive degree were measured,and statistically and spatially analyzed.Finally,combined with the data obtained from policy documents,statistical yearbooks and coordinate ranging,this paper constructed a multi-level linear model by selecting influencing factors from multiple levels of households and regions,and explored the impact directions and degrees of peasant professionalization and peasant immigration,as well as other factors,on farmland utilization intensity in Nanj ing.The main results and conclusions are as follows:(1)Based on the relevant theory and existing research,a comprehensive measurement system of peasants' professionalization level in Nanjing was established from the perspectives of peasants' quality,professional skills,occupation and salary,and market management.The comprehensive scores calculated by the entropy weight method and the equal weight method show that the level of peasants'professionalization is obviously distinct.And it basically presents a rule of"taking the junction of Jiangning District and Lishui District as the center,and decreasing gradually to the periphery by circle"in space;Peasant immigration situation is indicated by"whether or not this peasant is a foreign immigrant"and"farming years in the destination comminity".The result is concluded that the number and proportion of foreign peasants in the region may be related to regional agriculture development situation and the distance to the main agricultural product consumption market.Moreover,there is a clear spatial stratification pattern of"the earliest around the city center and the latest at the city edge"when it comes to the year of immigration.(2)The calculated intensive indicators such as farmland utilization degree,input intensity and output efficiency,show that there are obvious spatial differentiation rules in the utilization of farmland in Nanjing.?Multiple crop index tends to be"high in the center and low on the periphery"in the east-west direction;?Farmland employment labor investment presents a"closer to the city center,the more intensive"circle structure rule;?The total labor time input and family labor force input of peasant households show a spatial circle rule of"the farther away from the city center,the more intensive";?Agricultural capital investment intensity to farmland is high in the south and low in the north;?Average sales volume per mu shows a trend of"low around the urban center and on the southeastern periphery,high on the southwestern periphery of the city".(3)After dividing peasants' types according to professionalization scores and immigration indicators.this study found that there are obvious differences in the utilization and management of farmland among various types of farmers.?Foreign professional farmers are characterized by "high agricultural capital input,high labor-employment capital input,low family labor force input,low time cost,high commercialization,and high efficiency".? Local professional farmers are characterized by"sub-high agricultural capital input,sub-high labor-employment capital input,sub-high family labor force input,sub-high time cost,and sub-high commercialization".(3)Foreign traditional farmers are characterized by"high multiple cropping index,sub-low agricultural capital input,sub-low hired labor input,sub-low family engagement,sub-short labor time,and sub-high commercialization".?Local traditional peasants are characterized by"low agricultural resources input,low hired labor input,high family labor input,long labor time,and low commercialization".(4)The regression results of the multi-level linear model reveal that,on the one path dimension,the traditional small-peasants developing to become professional farmers will reduce the farmland reutilization degree.At the same time,however,the intensity of labor-employment capital input and agricultural capital input should be increased,and also with an improvement of commercial products output efficiency,which will help push the full employment of local agricultural labor force,promote the transformation from traditional agriculture to commodity agriculture,and improve local agricultural income and economic benefits.On the other path dimension,foreign farmers renting and utilizing farmland can improve the intensity of the local farmland's employment capital input.However,as the foreign farmer spending more years planting in that community and becoming more engaged in local agriculture management,his/her family labor input and agricultural capital investment per acre would be likely to fall.Therefore,the cross-regional migration of agricultural labor along the gradient is also conducive to promoting agricultural employment to the inflow areas.In addition,the grain-cash crop planting structure,greenhouse area and its proportion in total farming area,family population and economic characteristics,as well as agricultural policies,plot conditions,location advantages at household level,and overall social and economic development of that region,will also obviously affect the intensive use of farmland in varying degrees.Based on the above research results,this paper finally puts forward some policy enlightenment about comprehensive education for professional farmers,incentive policies for foreign farmers,organic connection between traditional peasants and modern agriculture,support policies for peasant diversion,sustainable utilization of agricultural land,overall planning of agricultural land-use structure and production structure,and improvement of agricultural produing conditions and environment.