Farmer Heterogeneity and Land Transfer Decisions Based on the Dual Perspectives of Economic Endowment and Land Endowment

Ying Cheng,Weizhong Zeng,Zhongbao Liu,Yuan Hu

doi:10.3390/land11030353

Abstract

Guiding qualified farmers to transfer their land is an important way to alleviate the problem of land abandonment, improve land use efficiency, and achieve moderately large-scale land management. Based on the dual perspectives of economic endowment and land endowment, this paper uses the 2015 data of the China Household Finance Survey (CHFS), using the semilogarithmic ordinary least-squares method and the logit model, to explore differences in land transfer decisions under the effect of farmer heterogeneity. The circulation trading market was further improved to provide a reference. The heterogeneity of economic endowment and land endowment significantly affects the decision-making behavior of farmers in transferring land. The higher the land endowment is, the greater the probability that farmers transfer the land out and successfully trade, and they are more inclined to transfer the cultivated land to cooperatives, village collectives, and other institutions through formal channels, leading to a higher unit income of the transfer. Further research shows that land endowment has no significant difference in the impact of land endowment on whether farmers with different livelihood endowments transfer their land, but under the same land endowment, farmers with economic endowment advantages are more able to use their own endowment advantages to transfer their land out through formal channels and obtain higher gains income. Therefore, focusing on improving the conditions of land resources and increasing the endowment of farmers are important means to promote successful transactions in the land transfer market, ensure its sustainable operation, and promote further increase in the income of transfer farmers.

Highlights

The extensive operation of traditional agriculture causes an increasing proportion of the rural population to move to neighboring towns or cities, which leads to an increase in the land abandonment rate year by year in rural areas, especially in remote mountainous areas or backward areas [1,2]
This paper proposes Hypothesis 1: land endowment has a significant positive impact on farmers’ land transfer decisions, and the better the land endowment is, the more inclined farmers are to transfer it to organizations through formal channels to obtain higher rental income
This paper proposes Hypothesis 2: economic endowment has a significant positive impact on farmers’ land transfer decisions, and the better the economic endowment is, the more inclined farmers are to transfer it to organizations through formal channels to obtain higher rental income

Summary

Introduction

The extensive operation of traditional agriculture causes an increasing proportion of the rural population to move to neighboring towns or cities, which leads to an increase in the land abandonment rate year by year in rural areas, especially in remote mountainous areas or backward areas [1,2]. Land circulation can effectively alleviate the problem of land abandonment, increase efficiency of land use and ecological security, optimize the distribution of elements, marginal output level, and income poverty reduction triple effect [3–6], and realize land scale management, solving food security and quality control problems in developing countries [7]. Brauw et al [8] reported that land transfer improves the mobility of Ethiopian farming households, increasing their incomes. Jin et al [9] testified that land transfer rents are important for poor people in developing countries such as Vietnam. Peng et al [7] reported that land transfer can increase farmers’ income and enhance their pension security. China is one of the largest developing countries in the world [10]. Collective land property rights are the basic system in rural China. As early as 2004, the State Council of China issued the Decision on Deepening Reform and Strict

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Conclusion