Heterogeneity and threshold in the effect of agricultural machinery on farmers' relative poverty.

Machinery is commonly used in the modernization of agricultural industries and is a pivotal way to eliminate poverty among farmers. However, there are still disputes regarding the effects of agricultural machinery on farmers' relative poverty. Neither the heterogeneity nor the thresholds in agricultural machinery-led poverty reduction efforts have been discussed in depth. To address those gaps, this study considers farmers' livelihood factors and resource (in)divisibility to investigate how agricultural machinery affects farmers' relative poverty as well as the heterogeneity of and thresholds in that influence. This study collected data from 1118 Chinese farming households. 2SLS-IVTobit regression results show that a 1% increase in the overall level of agricultural machinery leads to a 3.3% increase in farmers' income and a 0.523% decrease in their relative poverty. Furthermore, the three pathways of cost-saving, production efficiency, and labor allocation efficiency are identified as explaining 25.4%, 21.9%, and 21.3% of relative poverty reduction, respectively. The heterogeneity of these effects across different farming stages (i.e., plowing, sowing, and harvesting) is also examined, and the results show that plowing machinery has the largest effect. Then, a threshold analysis is conducted, which shows that farmers are influenced more when the scale of their farms surpasses the threshold of 1.12 hm2. Theoretically, this study establishes an integrated model that depicts how agricultural machinery affects farmers' relative poverty through production (in)divisibility. Practically, this study recommends additional investment in agricultural machinery (especially plowing machinery), farmland integration, and taking targeted measures to facilitate resource divisibility.

Research on the Impact of Rural Land Transfer on Non-Farm Employment of Farm Households: Evidence from Hubei Province, China.

Agricultural scale operations and industrialization promote the transfer of the rural labor force to the industry sector, and the non-farm employment of farmers plays a great role in increasing their income and reducing poverty. It is of great significance to explore the non-farm employment of farmers for the governance of relative poverty and the achievement of common prosperity. The propensity score matching (PSM) and generalized propensity score matching (GPSM) were used to analyze the impact of rural land transfer on farm households' non-farm employment. According to the PSM estimation, compared to the farmers' land not transferred, the rural land transfer significantly increased the proportion of non-farm employment personnel in farm households and the months of per year non-farm employment per person. The total land transfer, paddy land transfer and dry land transfer could significantly increase the proportion of non-farm employment personnel in farm households by 0.074, 0.029 and 0.085 units, respectively, and could significantly increase the months of per year non-farm employment per person by 0.604, 0.394 and 0.617 units, respectively. According to the GPSM estimation, different types of rural land transfer areas have significant positive effects on the proportion of non-farm workers and the months of per year non-farm employment per person, and show an obvious increasing trend of returns to scale, that is, the proportion of non-farm workers and the months of per year non-farm employment per person of farmers are higher than the increase in rural land transfer area. Additionally, the return to scale effect of dry land transfer area is more obvious. In order to raise the income of farm households and narrow the gap between urban and rural areas, the land transfer system can be further improved, urbanization with the county town as an important carrier can be vigorously promoted, the participation of farm households in non-farm employment in the local area can be promoted and the support policy system for non-farm employment of rural labor force can be improved.

Will land circulation sway "grain orientation"? The impact of rural land circulation on farmers' agricultural planting structures.

This study calculates the effect of different types of land circulation on farmers' decision-making regarding agricultural planting structure, using field survey data involving 1,120 households in Hubei province, China, and PSM (propensity score matching) and GPSM (general propensity score matching) methods. Results from PSM showed that land circulation could significantly increase farmers' decisions to plant food crops, which confirms the positive effect of rural land circulation on the "grain orientation" of crop planting structure. Results from GPSM further indicate that the total land circulation, the paddy land circulation, and the dry land circulation all have significantly positive effects on planting structure adjustment towards "grain orientation." Additionally, planting structure adjustment towards "grain orientation" increases as the scale of land circulation increases, and the former shows a higher rate of increase than the latter, which confirms that rural land circulation facilitates an adjustment in structure towards planting food crops.