Study On Production Efficiency Of The Forage Industry In Gansu Province

In recent years,the national food structure has been optimized,the demand for meat,eggs and milk has surged,and the animal husbandry has rapidly developed.Therefore,the traditional solutions of food security problems must be updated.Developing grassland agriculture and promoting grain-saving and non-grain feed are the fundamental ways to solve China’s food security issue.As the“regulator”of the industrial structure of the planting industry and the animal husbandry,the forge industry should be given nationally strategical concern.Gansu Province is traditionally strong in forage development,and grassland agriculture is also an important new way to develop modern agriculture.Improving the economic benefits and production efficiency of the forage industry in Gansu Province is rather signicant for the sustainable and healthy development of the forage industry and the animal husbandry provincially and nationally.Based on the unbalanced panel data of 45 forage enterprises and 25 cooperatives in Gansu Province’s dominant forage-production regions in recent 5 years,this paper analyzes their the economic benefits and production efficiencies through the input-output method and the stochastic frontier model,and further compares and analyzes the differences among different business entities and different planting modes.The results are as follows:(1)From 2015 to 2019,the productivity of the forage industry in Gansu Province had been continuously improved,and the economic benefits continuously increasing.The yield and benefits of are improving,overall.In terms of productivity,the average annual growth rates of yield and output value per hectare are 5.94%and 3.44%,respectively,and with the highest in 2019,16655.37kg and￥21,749.56 respectively.In terms of economic benefits,the net income increased from-371.8 yuan/hm~2 in 2015 to 2310.12 yuan/hm~2 in 2019,with the highest net return rate of 11.88%in 2019.In addition,the key indicator to restricting the economic benefits of forage industry in the whole province is land rent and machinery fee,which account for 28.33%and23.87%respectively on annual average.(2)The production efficiency of the forage industry in Gansu Province have continuously improved,but the forage industry has not yet achieved economies of scale.Among them,the technical efficiency is constantly improving with an annual average of 78.34%,and the Total Factor Productivity(TFP)of is increasing overall by 2.41%on annual average.Technological progress is the key to TFP growth,while the main obstacles are the decreasing change rate of technical efficiency and ineffective scale expansion,which reduce the TFP growth by 8.96%and1.52%respectively.(3)From the perspective of different business entities,the production efficiency of forage enterprises is higher than that of cooperatives from 2015 to 2019.Among them,TFP of forage enterprises increased by 3.44%annually,and that of cooperatives by 2.92%.In addition,the technical efficiency and scale return index of enterprises are 1.02 times and 1.11 times those of cooperatives,respectively.The most critical internal and external factors that restrict the development of forage enterprises and cooperatives in Gansu Province are the shortage of funds and poor sales channels.(4)From the perspective of different planting patterns,the production efficiency in dry farming areas is higher than that in irrigated areas.Among them,forage industry TFP in irrigated areas decreased by 0.61%annually,while in dry farming areas increased by 2.98%annually.In addition,further analyzing the TFP growth rate,the change of scale efficiency promoted the the TFP growth of the forage industry in irrigated area by 0.36%per year,while hindered that dry farming areas by 4.75%per year,indicating that the total factor input in irrigated areas was compatible with its scale return,but in dry farming area it was the opposite.According to this,in the development of the forage industry in Gansu Province,1)improving the production efficiency of cooperatives should be emphasized first,so as to drive farmers and herders to get rid of poverty and become rich.2)Government guidance should be strengthened to promote the forage industry development according to local conditions.Irrigated areas develop scaled intensive commercial forage industry,and dry farming areas promote the combination of forage and livestock,and strengthen the whole forage-livestock industry construction.3)and circulation should be regulated,and the implementation of forage breeding and independent research and development of machinery promoted.4)While promoting the technological progress and innovation improving the use efficiency of technology should be taken seriously to prevent ineffective scale expansion and resource waste.