Livelihood Resilience and Influential Factors of Nongchuangke: A Case Study of Zhejiang Province, China

Abstract

Nongchuangke refers to a new group of professional farmers that promotes agricultural innovation and sustainable development. Here, a comprehensive evaluation system for the livelihood-resilience index of the Nongchuangke in Zhejiang Province was constructed using three parameters: the buffer, self-organization, and learning capacities of the Nongchuangke. The entropy method was employed to comprehensively evaluate the livelihood resilience level of the Nongchuanke in Zhejiang Province, and a decision-making trail and evaluation laboratory with interpretive structural modeling was employed to clarify the hierarchical relationships among the limiting factors of the livelihood resilience of the Nongchuangke in Zhejiang Province and identify the key limiting factors. The results revealed that the average livelihood resilience level of the Nongchuangke in Zhejiang Province was low. Furthermore, the policy support, attraction of entrepreneurial investment, information-acquisition ability, and the number of Nongchuangke per 10,000 farmers were identified as the key factors influencing the livelihood resilience level of Nongchuangke in Zhejiang Province. Thus, new approaches that improve the identified influencing factors must be considered and implemented to improve the livelihood resilience level of the Nongchuangke.