Spatio-Temporal Differentiation of Non-Grain Production of Cropland and Its Influencing Factors: Evidence from the Yangtze River Economic Belt, China

Kun Zeng, Youlong Zhai, Liangsong Wang and Youhan Wang ()
Additional contact information
Kun Zeng: College of Geographic Science, Qinghai Normal University, Xining 810008, China
Youlong Zhai: School of Geographical Sciences, China West Normal University, Nanchong 637009, China
Liangsong Wang: College of Geomatics and Geoinformation, Guilin University of Technology, Guilin 541004, China
Youhan Wang: School of Geographical Sciences, China West Normal University, Nanchong 637009, China

Sustainability, 2024, vol. 16, issue 14, 1-19

Abstract: Food security is important to guarantee national security and people’s livelihoods, but the increasingly serious problem of non-grain production (NGP) on croplands has exacerbated the risk of food security and directly affected the sustainable development of the national economy and society. This study adopted 130 cities (states) in the Yangtze River Economic Belt as the research units and used ArcGIS10.8, GeoDA1.22, and Origin2022 software and spatial autocorrelation, standard deviational ellipse, and GeoDetector methods to conduct analyses. This study explored the spatial evolution patterns and factors influencing cropland NGP in the Yangtze River Economic Belt. The results show, firstly, that the NGP rate of cropland in the Yangtze River Economic Belt increased from 35.85% in 2006 to 38.62% in 2022. The number of cities (states) with mild and moderate NGP decreased, while the number of cities (states) with severe NGP increased significantly. Secondly, the spatial distribution of the rate of cropland NGP in the Yangtze River Economic Belt had a strong positive correlation, with “high–high agglomeration” tending to be dispersed, “low–low agglomeration” tending to be concentrated, and the overall trajectory of the center of gravity migrating from the northeast to the southwest. Thirdly, the single-factor detection found that the per capita food possession, slope, elevation, and average annual precipitation had strong explanatory power regarding the spatial difference in cropland NGP in the Yangtze River Economic Belt, and the interaction of any two influencing factors showed nonlinear enhancement. The results of this study can help to precisely identify the spatial and temporal evolution characteristics of cropland NGP in the Yangtze River Economic Belt, which is of great significance for supporting the country in controlling the risk of NGP cultivation, promoting the sustainable development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt, and guaranteeing food security.

Keywords: cropland; non-grain production; spatio-temporal differentiation; influencing factors; Yangtze river economic belt (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/16/14/6103/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/16/14/6103/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:16:y:2024:i:14:p:6103-:d:1436972

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().