Comparative Analysis of Changes in Cultivated Land and Economic Development in Suzhou and Xuzhou, Jiangsu Province
苏州市与徐州市耕地资源变化与经济发展关系的对比分析

There are clear differences in the relationship between changes in cultivated land use and economic development in different regions. This study analyzes the characteristics of changes in cultivated land in Suzhou and Xuzhou of Jiangsu Province from 1978 to 2006, based on statistical data. We conducted a correlation analysis to assess the relationship between changes in cultivated land and economic development, and estimated the net loss of cultivated land. Finally, we compared the consumption of cultivated land per unit of GDP for the two regions. Results show that the rate of loss of cultivated land had three peaks, and the annual decrease in cultivated land in Suzhou reached 1.34% per year. In Xuzhou, the total area of cultivated land changed only slightly, with an annual decrease of 0.33%. Changes in the per-capita area of cultivated land showed a similar trend. The area of cultivated land decreased exponentially with increasing GDP. The estimated values of cultivated land area calculated by the exponential function have lower error compared with the original values, which verifies that it is viable to use the exponential function to predict changes in conversion of cultivated land based on increases in GDP. The area of cultivated land occupied due to increasing GDP decreased continuously with economic development, but at different rates in the two regions. The rate of decline in Suzhou was about five times faster than that of Xuzhou. Changes in the process of converting cultivated land created two distinct phases, before and after the year 2000. In the first phase, from 1978 to 1999, the annual area of cultivated land occupied per unit of GDP increase in Xuzhou was always more than that of Suzhou. In the second phase, the situation was reversed. The annual cultivated land consumption per unit of GDP increase in Xuzhou was gradually less than that of Suzhou from 2000 to 2006, declining to 8.93 hm2 in 2006, which was no more than one sixth of the amount of land converted in Suzhou.