Study on the Mechanism of Agricultural Greenhouse Gas Emission Reduction Under Macro Emission Reduction Measures

Abstract

Clarifying the impact of macro emission reduction measures on the mechanism of agricultural greenhouse gas emission reduction is of great significance in promoting climate change governance and the construction of a carbon emission reduction policy system. This paper explores the mechanism of important macro emission reduction measures based on a multi-level progressive factor decomposition perspective and designs a coupled model of computable general equilibrium and structural path decomposition to identify the key emission reduction paths of major macro emission reduction measures and to decompose the drivers that promote emission reduction in each path. This study found that: (1) The emission reduction effect of the combination of carbon tax, carbon sink and carbon capture, utilization, and storage macro emission reduction measures is dominated by the indirect emission reduction triggered by the industrial chain, accounting for 95.67% of the total agricultural GHG emission reduction, and the emission reduction effect is gradually weakened with the increase in the production level. (2) The emission intensity effect and the industrial structure effect are the main drivers of the macro emission reduction portfolio measures to promote emission reduction, but there are differences in the roles of the different drivers on the various production levels and different emission reduction pathways. (3) Vegetables, fertilizers, the light industry, and other key industries are the main agricultural greenhouse gas emission reduction contributing industries, of which the emission reduction contribution from citizen consumption is the largest, and the emission reduction is mainly achieved by influencing the demand path of the vegetable industry and the light industry to the upstream high-energy-consuming or high-emission industries. Therefore, there is a need to fully utilize the mechanisms that drive emission reduction at different production levels and pathways by each key factor and to take targeted measures to promote synergistic emission reduction among industries. In the short term, focus on enhancing the role of the emission intensity effect, while in the medium and long term, pay much attention to the positive role of the industrial structure effect on agricultural greenhouse gas emissions.