Tao Jin

Ensuring grain self-sufficiency through sustained yield growth is central to China’s food security policy. Yet, the long-term sustainability of this yield-centric model is in doubt. This study shifts the analytical focus from single-factor yield to a holistic measure of productive efficiency. We calculate Technical Efficiency (TE) scores for Jiangsu Province’s staple grains (rice, wheat, maize) from 1975 to 2024 using a Super-Slacks-Based Measure (Super-SBM) model, integrating physical output and output value. A Tobit regression identifies drivers of TE change. Results show that TE evolved in three phases aligned with major policy shifts: incentive restoration, market liberalization, and production support. While TE improved sequentially, the post-2004 support phase reveals a critical paradox: yields now exceed the economic efficiency frontier, yet this coincides with systematic input redundancy, particularly capital overuse, and suppressed profitability. This indicates that efficiency gains, driven mainly by pure technical efficiency, are being eroded by diminishing economic sustainability. Regression analysis shows that urbanization and cropping structure hinder TE, whereas market prices, irrigation, and mechanization enhance it. The study concludes that the prevailing yield-maximization paradigm undermines economic viability. A sustainable transition requires shifting from chasing maximum yields to optimizing productive efficiency through cost-saving technologies and market-conforming incentives.

China is striving to leverage the power of science and technology to green its agriculture and simultaneously enhance grain productivity. To assess the performance dynamics of the dual agricultural mission, this study presents the green growth rate of agriculture using the DEA-based Green Total Factor Productivity (GTFP) indicator, together with the growth rate of grain yields, and applies it to the case of Jiangsu, a major grain-producing province with a well-developed economy. It is found that Jiangsu’s agriculture has generally performed well during the implementation of the two major national strategies addressing green development and grain security, especially in northern Jiangsu, which is a major grain-producing area. In contrast, the phased fluctuations in green growth in agriculture in southern Jiangsu are more pronounced, with negative green growth even occurring during the green agriculture movement. Much of the volatility in agricultural green growth at the provincial, subregional and municipal levels is generated by the effects of the movement of the green technology frontier, which is led by the best practitioners. Accordingly, the possibility of improving the weak state of the catch-up effect on green growth is explored from the perspective of the Chinese government-led agricultural science and innovation system; it also traces the green agricultural initiatives in the main grain-marketing areas that have failed to deliver the expected green growth, and recommends a review of such policies and a refinement of the GTFP Index tool for assessing sustainable green growth.

China is striving to leverage the power of science and technology to green its agriculture while increasing grain productivity. In this context, this study presents the green growth rate of agriculture from the DEA-based Green Total Factor Productivity (GTFP) indicator, together with the growth rate of grain yields, and applies it to the case of Jiangsu, a major grain-producing province with a well-developed economy. It is found that Jiangsu's agriculture has generally performed well in the implementation of the two major national strategies of green development and grain security, especially in the northern Jiangsu, which is a major grain-producing area. In contrast, the phased fluctuations of green growth in agriculture in Southern Jiangsu are more pronounced, with even negative green growth occurring during the green agriculture movement. Much of the volatility in agricultural green growth at the provincial, subregional, municipal level comes from the effects of the movement of the green technology frontier led by best practitioners. Accordingly, the possibility of improving the weak state of the catch-up effect on green growth is explored from the perspective of the Chinese government-led agricultural science and innovation system; it also traces the green agricultural initiatives in the main grain-marketing areas that have failed to deliver the expected green growth, and recommends a review of such policies and refinement of the GTFP Index tool for assessing sustainable green growth.

The impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on food security is a major global issue. It is also reasonable to take Farm Produce as the perspective of this review. The main problem of this review is the analysis framework, that is, the logical relationship...

The dislocated development of population, land, and economy will disturb the urban system, cause ecological risk problems, and ultimately affect regional habitat and quality development. Based on social statistics and nighttime lighting data from 2000 to 2018, we used mathematical statistics and spatial analysis methods to analyze the change process of urbanization’s coupling coordination degree and ecological risk response pattern in the Yangtze River Delta. Results show that: ① From 2000 to 2018, the coupling coordination degree of urbanization in the Yangtze River Delta increased, with high values in Suzhou-Wuxi-Changzhou, Shanghai, Nanjing and Hangzhou regions. ② The ecological risk in the Yangtze River Delta weakened, and the vulnerability and disturbance of landscape components together constitute the spatial differentiation pattern of regional ecological risk, which presented homogeneous aggregation and heterogeneous isolation. ③ The overall ecological stress of urbanization in the Yangtze River Delta decreased. ④ The population aggregation degree, socio-economic development level and built-up area expansion trend contributed to the spatiotemporal differentiation of urbanization’s ecological risks through the synergistic effects of factor concentration and diffusion, population quality cultivation and improvement, technological progress and dispersion, industrial structure adjustment and upgrading. This study can provide a reference for regional urbanization to deal with ecological risks reasonably and achieve high-quality development.

This study evaluated the agricultural eco-efficiency (AEE) of 77 counties and districts in Jiangsu Province from 1999 to 2018 using the slack-based measure (SBM) of efficiency in data envelopment analysis (DEA) (SBM-DEA) and analyzed its spatiotemporal evolution characteristics and influencing factors. We found that 1) the overall AEE, pure technology efficiency (PTE), and scale efficiency (SE) exhibited a fluctuating downward trend. AEE exhibited a significantly positive spatial association and an increasingly widening regional inequality. 2) AEE featured the “high south” and “low north” spatial pattern, with the high-value regions concentrated around the Taihu Lake plain region in southern Jiangsu Province (Sunan) and low-value regions scattered across most of the northern Jiangsu Province (Subei) cities. The high-high and low-low spatial association types further confirmed the existence of the north–south agglomeration pattern. 3) PTE and SE exhibited a similar “high south” and “low north” spatial pattern to that of AEE. The areas with the growth trends of AEE, PTE, and SE were clustered in Xuzhou and Nanjing city and in the bordering regions between Yangzhou and the Huai’an city, and also between Changzhou and the Wuxi city. 4) Excessive redundant input and use of pesticides, chemical fertilizers, agricultural diesel, labor, land, and agricultural carbon emissions, all have been the primary factors affecting Jiangsu’s AEE. Irrigation also considerably affected AEE, while mechanical power and agricultural film have minimal effects. The majority of counties and districts in the Subei, central Jiangsu Province (Suzhong), and Ningzhen Yang Hilly region experienced excessive usage of chemical fertilizers, pesticides, chemical fertilizers, agricultural diesel, labor, and land. The findings can improve understanding of the spatial association effect and underlying impediment of AEE and can further help policymakers promoting agricultural eco-efficiency.

In order to revealed the spatial-temporal correlation characteristics and interaction relationship of multifunctional land use in the county of Jiangsu Province, which could provide theoretical support for the spatial planning of the county. This paper constructed multiple functional identification system from three dimensions of production-living-ecological, and quantitatively measures 55 counties’ spatial equilibrium state and space-time effect of “production-living-ecological” function in 1996, 2005 and 2015 by means of coupling coordination degree model, Theil coefficient and its decomposition, and LISA time path analysis. The results showed that spatial equilibrium level of multifunctional land use function in the county of Jiangsu Province was relatively low from 1996 to 2015, presenting the spatial characteristics of the overall dispersion and local agglomeration. The coordination degree of multifunctional land use had spatial differentiation characteristics,which were closely related to the stage of social economic development. The time-space transition of multiple functional coordination degree was generally consistent with the cold-hot spot pattern. The regions with relatively long LISA time path were scattered in southern Jiangsu (Nanjing, Suzhou, Wuxi, Changzhou and Yangzhou). The regions with relatively short LISA time path were scattered in northern Jiangsu, central Jiangsu. The multiple functional coordination degree was relatively low in these areas.The county with the largest LISA time path curvature were Zhenjiang, Xinghua, Yancheng, Guanyun etc. Nevertheless, the curvature of LISA time path in most parts of central Jiangsu and northern Jiangsu was generally small. It can be seen that the path locking effect of development of multifunctional land use coordination degree was strong.

Traditional farming practice of rice field co-culture is a time-tested example of sustainable agriculture, which increases food productivity of arable land with few adverse environmental impacts. However, the small-scale farming practice needs to be adjusted for modern agricultural production. Screening of rice field co-culture farming models is important in deciding the suitable model for industry-wide promotion. In this study, we aim to find the optimal rice field co-culture farming models for large-scale application, based on the notion of food productivity. We used experimental data from the Jiangsu Province of China and applied food-equivalent unit and arable-land-equivalent unit methods to examine applicable protocols for large-scale promotion of rice field co-culture farming models. Results indicate that the rice-loach and rice-catfish models achieve the highest food productivity; the rice-duck model increases the rice yield, while the rice-turtle and rice-crayfish models generate extra economic profits. Simultaneously considering economic benefits, staple food security, and regional food output, we recommend the rice-duck, rice-crayfish, and rice-catfish models. Simulating provincial promotion of the above three models, we conclude that food output increases from all three recommended models, as well as the land production capacity. The rice-catfish co-culture model has the most substantial food productivity. None of the three models threatens staple food security, as they do not compete for land resources with rice cultivation.