Rural Hollowing in Key Agricultural Areas of China: Characteristics,Mechanisms and Countermeasures

During the process of rapid urbanization and industrialization in China,numerous agricultural surplus labors in traditional agricultural areas transferred to non-agricultural sectors in urban areas. As a result,resident population in rural areas has entered a transitional period of rapid decrease in 1996,but rural residential land continues to expand significantly,and there are an increasing number of hollow villages. This phenomenon is known as rural hollowing,which is a recent geographic phenomenon that has received increasing attention in transitional China. This process strongly supported China's labor-intensive industrialization,but consequent rural hollowing has caused a series of problems,such as inefficient rural residential land use,decrease in the ability of rural inner development,and deterioration of living environment in rural communities. A better understanding of the spatio-temporal characteristics and driving mechanisms of rural hollowing in contemporary China under rapid urbanization and industrialization is an important premise for constituting feasible policy and strategy so as to make efficient use of land resources and promote new countryside construction. Taking Dancheng County,a typical less developed agricultural county in the south of the Huanghuaihai Plain of China as an example,this paper analyzes basic characteristics,forming mechanisms,and adjustment strategies of rural hollowing using data collected from questionnaire surveys and in-depth interviews of 157 farmers and 63 village cadres,and village-level agricultural census,remote sensing images,and national and county-level statistical yearbooks. Results show that in general rural hollowing could be characterized as the hollowing of industries,infrastructure,and residential population and settlements,and be explained as a degenerate result of the effect of the urban-rural dual system on rural natural,ecological,social and economic systems in a specific urban-rural region. Resource endowment,geographic location,historical basis,social culture,and the urban-rural dual system are the major driving forces of rural hollowing. At the same time,non-linear interactions among them were also significant. The core objective and appropriate path to optimize the practice of rural hollowing should be to realize optimal allocation of rural resources,and enhance endogenous development capacity gradually and steadily with the prerequisite of effective institutions,complete market,and ensure that the local farmers are the main actors and beneficiaries. Propelling a comprehensive consolidation of rural settlements scientifically according to local conditions can build a new platform and be an integrated approach to controlling the rural hollowing.