Family care, rural labour migration and land lease: A case study of Jiangxi Province, China

ABSTRACT

The farmland lease is an important way to improve the scale of farmland management and agricultural modernization. Based on survey data for 578 rural households in Jiangxi Province, a Tobit model, and intermediary effect analysis method were used to determine how family care affects farmland lease by influencing off-farm employment. The main conclusions were as follows: (1) When more members of a family needed care, more rural households tended to rent in farmland. Care for the elderly and care for children aged 0–4 years had no significant impact on farmland lease, but care for children aged 5–15 years had a significant and positive influence on farmland rent-in. (2) The number of members in need of care within the family did not significantly affect farmland rent-out, but the care of children aged 0–4 years significantly reduced the possibility of farmers renting out their farmland. (3) Family care reduced the possibility of farmers renting out land but promoted land rent-in by inhibiting labour migration. (4) The intermediary effect of out-county off-farm employment in the influence of family care on farmland lease was significant, but the intermediary effect of local off-farm employment was not significant.

KEYWORDS:

• Family care
• off-farm labour migration
• farmland lease
• intermediary effect analysis

Acknowledgments

Authors of this article would like to thank all people who participated in this study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Informed consent from participants

Informed consent was obtained from all subjects involved in the study.

Consent to publish statement

All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

Author contributions

Conceptualization, Hui Xiao, Huiting Xiao and Fangting Xie; formal analysis, Hui Xiao and Xian Liang; investigation: all authors; writing-original draft preparation: Hui Xiao and Fangting Xie; writing – review and editing,Fangting Xie.;supervision, Hui Xiao and Fangting Xie; project administration,Fangting Xie.

Declarations and ethics statements

For this research, we used a sample survey dataset with all individual identifiers removed. No ethical approval was required due to the type and nature of the dataset used. All participants were informed about research purposes and gave their written consent to use their responses in future analyses. Participants were also informed that their participation was voluntary and anonymous, and that researchers observed GDPR obligations in terms of handling data. The investigation and research Methodology conforms to the principles outlined in the Declaration of Helsinki. The dataset for this study were obtained by research by the corresponding author team, and access to and use of the sample dataset described in this study required approval from the corresponding author.

Additional information

Funding

This study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 42161053; 41701622); the Scientific Research Development Fund Project of Zhejiang A&F University (Grant No.2022FR014).