Never far from the land we manage

China's Land Problem

Readers could pick just about any business or agricultural publication at random these days and hit an article about the Chinese growth miracle... about this becoming the “Chinese Century.” And the reason is simple enough: the giant nation’s recent economic success begs discussion and analysis. However, China is bumping up against a shortage of important natural resources that could limit that country’s growth prospects. The declining resources? Farmland and water. One of the results of the Chinese economic miracle is the emergence of a growing, thriving middle class. This growth is fed by migration from the country to cities and is happening in such numbers that their need for housing and other amenities is gobbling up arable land and diverting water from farming. According to Worldwatch Institute, urban construction has taken more than 2 million hectares of farmland out of production. Even worse, Eastern China where the building is most rapid, includes most of the top farmland in the nation. In the West, government eco-policies have encouraged the conversion of marginal farmland to forest or grassland re-planting. The net effect is to reduce China’s farmland by 8 million hectares—just less than 7%--in the past decade.