A Comprehensive Evaluation of Benefit of High-Standard Farmland Development in China

Abstract

In 2013, the government officially approved the construction task of developing high-standard farmland, which had been written into the outline of the “12th Five-Year Plan”, the “13th Five-Year Plan” and the “14th Five-Year Plan”, effectively ensuring the sustainable development of farmland with high and stable yield in China. Moreover, with the rapid progress of urbanization and industrialization, the quality and usage of cultivated land have changed greatly, and the relationship between the economic value, social value and ecological value of land has become increasingly prominent. Whether the development of high-standard farmland, especially the high-standard farmland used for grain production, has achieved the goals of increasing farmers’ income, agricultural output and rural development is not clear. Therefore, it is necessary to evaluate the comprehensive benefits of high-standard farmland development in grain production, so as to scientifically measure the results of the development. From the perspective of economic, social and ecological benefits, this paper establishes an entropy weight evaluation index system and a model to evaluate the level and effectiveness of high-standard farmland development from 2013 to 2020 in China. The results show that the high-standard farmland development project has improved the yield of grain and the basic productivity of cultivated land, effectively increased the yields of land in the project area and promoted the protection and improvement of cultivated land quality, which includes soil quality improvement, soil fertility enhancement, pollution control and soil remediation. The project also helped raise the farmers’ income levels and improved farmers’ agricultural knowledge and skills in the project area. The projects are very beneficial for agricultural production, the farmers’ income and rural development. However, there is still a certain gap between the national average level of improvement and the original goal set in the policy. The average grain yield per mu (Note: 1 mu ≈ 0.0667 ha, similarly hereinafter) was expected to be increased by less than 100 kg (the national average was a 40 kg increase), and the degrees of improvement in economic, social, ecological and comprehensive benefits in different project types were also different. In the future, we suggest that the project should be implemented according to local conditions and the features of each region. We should pay attention to the protection of basic farmland quality and further improve grain output to achieve the goal of stabilizing and increasing production.