The farmland shelterbelt is an important artificial ecological project for improving farmland microclimates, ensuring agricultural production, and promoting sustainable development in China’s ecologically fragile areas. Due to the quasi-public attribute, farmland shelterbelts were mainly constructed and managed by the government in the past. In recent years, the reform of the separation of three rights in collective forestland and the mechanism of “private supply of public goods” have prompted farmers to participate in the modern forest management system. However, there is a lack of consistency between farmers’ management intentions and actual contract operation and management behaviors, resulting in weakened management and protection in many places, which seriously restricts the construction efficiency of farmland shelterbelts. Therefore, based on the survey data and planning behavior theory (TPB) of 1106 farmers in 16 major agricultural production areas (counties) in Xinjiang, this study aims to explore the key factors affecting farmers ‘forestry management and production decision making and to verify the transformation mechanism of farmers’ behavior through path analysis. The results show that the management decisions of farmers in ecologically fragile areas follow the path form of “cognitive → intention → behavior”, in which the multi-dimensional cognition of farmers has a significant impact on farmers’ behavioral intention, while the effect on behavioral response is relatively small, which currently depends on the promotion of ecological compensation and government behavior. Finally, this study puts forward countermeasures and suggestions for continuously stimulating the farmers’ forest operation behavior and provides policy reference for promoting the sustainable development of farmland shelterbelts in ecologically fragile areas put forward countermeasures and suggestions for continuously stimulating farmers’ forestry behavior.

Facility agriculture can increase production efficiency and alleviate resource constraints. Its developmental level has become one of the most important indicators of the level of agricultural modernization worldwide. The Chinese government has attached great importance to the development of facility agriculture in recent years. Since 2020, the “No. 1 Document” has continuously emphasized and deployed the development of facility agriculture. Global climate change has greatly impacted the traditional agricultural production that is vulnerable to weather changes, while the development of facility agriculture can to some extent alleviate the limitations of climate conditions on agricultural production. However, it is unclear whether facility agriculture can help alleviate the adverse effects of global climate change, i.e., reducing greenhouse gas emissions. In view of this, in this research, based on the data from the latest National Compilation of Cost and Benefit Data on Agricultural Products in 2022, the greenhouse gas emissions and carbon emission indicators of open-field and greenhouse cucumber productions in China were measured using the life cycle assessment method (the full cycle of agricultural ecosystems). The results show that the average total greenhouse gas emissions (4572.67 kgCE·hm⁻²) from China’s facility cucumber production system are significantly higher than those from traditional open-field production methods (8712.86 kgCE·hm⁻²), with net greenhouse gas emissions from facility cucumber cultivation being on average 98.78% higher than those from open fields. Combining indicators such as land carbon intensity, carbon productivity, and carbon economic efficiency, it can be concluded that the sustainability of facility cucumber cultivation is lower than that of open-field cucumber cultivation. Additionally, considering the comprehensive differences in economic development, resource endowments, planting methods, and technological inputs across different regions, there are significant inter-provincial variations in the greenhouse gas composition, carbon sequestration, carbon ecological efficiency, carbon productivity, and carbon economic efficiency of both open-field and facility cucumbers. However, overall, carbon productivity shows a certain geographical proximity effect, with an increasing trend from south to north for open-field cucumbers. The above research findings provide direct evidence for the development of facility agriculture in China. Based on these measurement results and analytical conclusions, this paper further explores how to reduce carbon emissions and promote emission reduction in facility agriculture, providing reliable empirical support for policy implementation by relevant authorities and academic research.

Pest and disease control outsourcing has become an effective means to restore damaged arable land and guarantee agroecological benefits. However, it is adopted at a relatively low rate in China. The purpose of this study is to explore, from the perspective of government intervention, behavioral logic, and the game relationship among farmers, service organizations and the government in the pest and disease control outsourcing system as well as the endogenous motivation of each subject. The results indicate that when the degree of policy implementation is low, the government’s policy is ineffective, but, after reaching a certain level, the higher the degree of policy implementation is, the stronger the farmers’ willingness to choose outsourcing control and the service organizations’ willingness to provide positive control services are, and the faster the stable state of tripartite joint pest and disease control is formed. In the case of implementing a single policy tool, the convergence rate of each party that implements the regulatory policy alone is fast but may be unstable, while the rate is slow but more stable when a guidance- or incentive-based policy is solely applied. The effect of a combination of policy tools being applied is much better than that of a single policy tool being applied. The simultaneous implementation of the three types of policy tools can form a policy system with both positive and negative mechanisms, which can maximize the complementary and superposition effects.

The purpose of this study is to explore, from the perspective of government interven-tion, behavioral logic and game relationship among farmers, service organizations and the gov-ernment in the pest and disease control outsourcing system, as well as the endogenous motiva-tion of each subject. The results indicate that the stronger the willingness of each subject, the faster the stable state of joint pest and disease control among the three parties can be formed; In the case of implementing a single policy tool, the convergence rate of each party that imple-ments the regulatory policy alone is fast but may be unstable, while the rate is slow but more stable when a guidance- or incentive-based policy is solely applied; The effect of policy tool combination is much better than that of a single policy tool applied. The simultaneous imple-mentation of the three types of policy tools can form a policy system with both positive and negative mechanisms, which can maximize complementary and superposition effect.

Climate change induced by greenhouse gas emissions is currently one of the most important challenges of the world. Against this backdrop, we deeply explore the temporal variation characteristics of vegetable production in Guangdong Province, a major province of China from the carbon footprint perspective. The aim is to promote the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions from agricultural production and carbon sequestration, as well as sustainable agricultural development. We primarily adopted the carbon emission coefficient provided by Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and utilized data from the China Rural Statistical Yearbook and the Guangdong Rural Statistical Yearbook from 1990 to 2022 to analyze the changing characteristics of the carbon footprint of vegetable production in Guangdong Province. In addition, we used the grey prediction model GM (1, 1) to estimate the parameters and test the residual. Then, the carbon emission of vegetable production in Guangdong province was predicted from 2023 to 2060. The research results show that agricultural input is the largest source of carbon emissions, accounting for 51.99–66.55%, followed by farmland soil utilization (33.45–48.01%). Within agricultural input, fertilizers, pesticides, and mulching films are the main sources of carbon emissions. Based on the data from 2011 to 2022, it is predicted that the net carbon emissions of vegetable production in Guangdong Province will continue to decline after 2022. Based on the above findings, it is suggested to promote the sustainable development of the vegetable industry by increasing policy support for the R&D and promotion of green and low-carbon technologies and green vegetable production, reducing agricultural input, and promoting the formation of the low-carbon production concept.

Facility agriculture can increase production efficiency and alleviate resource constraints. Its developmental level has become one of the most important indicators of the level of agricultural modernization worldwide. The Chinese government has attached great importance to the development of facility agriculture in recent years. Since 2020, the "No.1 Document" has continuously emphasized and deployed the development of facility agriculture. Global climate change has greatly impacted the traditional agricultural production that is vulnerable to weather changes, while the development of facility agriculture can to some extent alleviate the limitations of climate conditions on agricultural production. However, it is unclear whether facility agriculture can help alleviate the adverse effects of global climate change, i.e., reducing greenhouse gas emissions. In view of this, in this research, based on the data from the latest National Compilation of Cost and Benefit Data on Agricultural Products in 2022, the greenhouse gas emissions and carbon emission indicators of open-field and greenhouse cucumber productions in China were measured using the life cycle assessment method (the full cycle of agricultural ecosystems). Besides, the differences in greenhouse gas emissions between different cultivation patterns and provinces were explored, providing industry-level empirical evidence on how to vigorously develop facility agriculture while addressing global climate change. Finally, further discussions were made on how to reduce carbon emissions from facility agriculture based on the measurement results and conclusions. This research will provide reliable empirical basis for policy making and implementation and relevant academic research.