IMPACT OF SOCIO-ECONOMIC FACTORS ON SOIL FERTILITY OVER TIME
土壤肥力变化的社会经济影响因素分析

As is well known, soil quality changes over time due to natural processes and impacts of human activities, especially the impacts of farmer's land cultivation activities on soil fertility have been deepening. Due to a large population and the scarcity of soil resources, worldwide attention has heavily focused on the soil fertility changes in China, since early 1980s. Meanwhile, great changes have also taken place within the institutions, policies and economy of rural China. The goal of this paper is to find the possible socio economic factors that may influence the dynamic change in soil fertility and their intrinsic relationship, using soil nutrients data from the early 1980s to 2000, as well as corresponding socio economic field survey data. Results from simple analyses show that the level of economic development has a role in promoting soil fertility, whereas the endowment of cultivated land has an adverse effect. In this paper, we do not find an obvious relationship between land property rights and the evolution of soil fertility. The change in MCI of tilled land did not cause depletion of soil nutrients over the past two decades covered by our data. Soil organic matter contents can also be raised through continuously plowing under stalks into land.