Alloeative inefficiency in agriculture is an issue puzzling researchers and poliey-makers in China. Based on household data from the China Family Panel Studies of 2012, the present paper quantifies the potential disto...Alloeative inefficiency in agriculture is an issue puzzling researchers and poliey-makers in China. Based on household data from the China Family Panel Studies of 2012, the present paper quantifies the potential distortions in China ＇s agricultural production and examines their underlying determinants across regions. The results reveal that there are different levels of distortions across regions. The Middle region is facing the greatest distortion. Increases in machinery input, the proportion of non-farm income and effective labor input will reduce distortions. Household saving, farmland rent and farmland size are significantly positively related to distortions. There is a complementary effect between labor and farmland in alleviating production inefficiency, but substitution effects exist between capital and farmland and also capital and labor. The increase in farmland size will aggravate the impact of capital on distortions. Given the constraint of super small-scale farmland, facilitating land transfer is a necessary precondition for improving, allocative efficiency.展开更多
Although China has reduced its poor population from 250 million in 1978 to 30 million in 2003, an overall reduction in world poverty still depends on progress being made in China because of its huge population. The co...Although China has reduced its poor population from 250 million in 1978 to 30 million in 2003, an overall reduction in world poverty still depends on progress being made in China because of its huge population. The concentration of poor in western rural regions makes China＇s task of poverty alleviation complex. Clearer and more transparent analyses on the reasons for poverty are essential prerequisites of any development policy that puts poverty reduction at its heart. The purpose of this paper is to identify causes for being poor in western rural China. It argues that the essence of rural income poverty in the western region is water poverty. Low efficiency of agricultural productivity resulting from poor land quality and uneven distribution of water resources has led to heavy dependence on irrigated agriculture. Irrigated agriculture has played and will play a critical role in creating employment opportunities and alleviating poverty. Existing water shortages and competition for different water utilization make it imperative to enhance the efficiency of water resource management.展开更多
基金This research was supported by the Major Program of the National Social Science Foundation of China （No. 14 ZDA070）, the Key Project of Natural Science of Zhejiang Province （No. LZ 14G30001） and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities.
文摘Alloeative inefficiency in agriculture is an issue puzzling researchers and poliey-makers in China. Based on household data from the China Family Panel Studies of 2012, the present paper quantifies the potential distortions in China ＇s agricultural production and examines their underlying determinants across regions. The results reveal that there are different levels of distortions across regions. The Middle region is facing the greatest distortion. Increases in machinery input, the proportion of non-farm income and effective labor input will reduce distortions. Household saving, farmland rent and farmland size are significantly positively related to distortions. There is a complementary effect between labor and farmland in alleviating production inefficiency, but substitution effects exist between capital and farmland and also capital and labor. The increase in farmland size will aggravate the impact of capital on distortions. Given the constraint of super small-scale farmland, facilitating land transfer is a necessary precondition for improving, allocative efficiency.
文摘Although China has reduced its poor population from 250 million in 1978 to 30 million in 2003, an overall reduction in world poverty still depends on progress being made in China because of its huge population. The concentration of poor in western rural regions makes China＇s task of poverty alleviation complex. Clearer and more transparent analyses on the reasons for poverty are essential prerequisites of any development policy that puts poverty reduction at its heart. The purpose of this paper is to identify causes for being poor in western rural China. It argues that the essence of rural income poverty in the western region is water poverty. Low efficiency of agricultural productivity resulting from poor land quality and uneven distribution of water resources has led to heavy dependence on irrigated agriculture. Irrigated agriculture has played and will play a critical role in creating employment opportunities and alleviating poverty. Existing water shortages and competition for different water utilization make it imperative to enhance the efficiency of water resource management.
