Heterogeneous effects of rural-urban migration on agricultural productivity: Evidence from China
China Agricultural Economic Review
ISSN: 1756-137X
Article publication date: 11 July 2018
Issue publication date: 22 August 2018
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the impacts of rural–urban migration on agricultural (labor) productivity in China.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper closely follows the framework of Rozelle et al. (1999), Taylor et al. (2003) and Atamanov and Van den Berg (2012)—new economics of labor migration—to demonstrate the heterogeneous effects of migration on agricultural productivity, using simultaneous equations extended by an interaction term of off-farm income and household wealth.
Findings
The results empirically verify two key theoretical predictions: the loss of labor available for agricultural activities decreases rice yield per worker per day, and the off-farm income that may relax liquidity constraints has a positive offsetting effect, which becomes weaker with increasing household wealth. The final calculation based on these two contradictory influences indicates that the lost-labor effect dominates across all levels of household wealth, resulting in a negative net impact of rural–urban migration on agricultural productivity. The key results are shown to hold for land productivity as well.
Originality/value
To the best of the author’s knowledge, it is the first paper to examine the impacts of rural–urban migration on labor productivity and the heterogeneity across households with different levels of wealth. A major policy issue facing national leaders is whether the massive and ongoing outflow of labor will be a threat to China’s rural development and its food security in the future. This paper provides insightful ideas in a different way.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The author is deeply grateful to Dr Jane Golley for her valuable time, advice and corrections to this paper and also for the insightful comments made by Professor Bruce Chapman. The author would also like to thank Professor Tamara Jacka, Dr Kailing Shen, Dr Ligang Song and other participants in seminars given at Australian Center on China in the World of The Australian National University on April 11, 2017; Crawford School of Public Policy of The Australian National University on June 2, 2017; and the 29th CESA Annual Conference at University of Western Australia, Perth, Australia, July 12-14, 2017.
Citation
Shi, X. (2018), "Heterogeneous effects of rural-urban migration on agricultural productivity: Evidence from China", China Agricultural Economic Review, Vol. 10 No. 3, pp. 482-497. https://doi.org/10.1108/CAER-10-2017-0193
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2018, Emerald Publishing Limited