Moving off the Farm : Land Institutions to Facilitate StructuralTransformation and Agricultural Productivity Growth in China

Deininger, Klaus ; Jin, Songqing ; Xia, Fang

关键词: AGRARIAN REFORM;    AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT;    AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS;    AGRICULTURAL ECONOMY;    AGRICULTURAL EMPLOYMENT;   

DOI  :  10.1596/1813-9450-5949
RP-ID  :  WPS5949

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

Agriculture has made major contributionsto China's economic growth and poverty reduction, butthe literature has rarely focused on the institutionalfactors that might underpin such structural transformationand productivity. This paper aims to fill that gap. Drawingon an 8-year panel of 1,200 households in six key provinces,it explores the impact of government land reallocations andformal land-use certificates on agricultural productivitygrowth, as well as the likelihood of households to exit fromagriculture or send family members to the non-farm sector.It finds that land tenure insecurity, measured by thehistory of past land reallocations, discourages householdsfrom quitting agriculture. The recognition of land rightsthrough formal certificates encourages the temporarymigration of rural labor. Both factors have a large impacton productivity (at about 30 percent each), mainly byencouraging market-based land transfers. A sustainedincrease in non-agricultural opportunities will likelyreinforce the importance of secure land tenure, which is aprecondition for successful structural transformation andcontinued economic attractiveness of rural areas.