Achieving the goal of zero hunger within the goal of sustainable development requires improving the resilience of food systems to various types of risk shocks; food systems have shown significant vulnerability to COVID-19 outbreaks and transmission. By analyzing the impact of China’s lockdown policy and food security emergency policy in 2020 on food prices during the COVID-19 pandemic, we can clarify the role of policy intervention in enhancing the resilience of the food system, which can provide guidance, using China’s experience, for dealing with global food safety emergencies in the future. Firstly, we selected Beijing, Shanghai and Guangdong as food-consuming areas, and Shandong, Henan, and Hubei as food-producing areas. We also collected food security emergency policy data from the Chinese government website during the COVID-19 pandemic. Secondly, a difference-in-difference method was used to observe that Chinese cabbage and pork prices in the main food-producing areas and food-consuming areas rose more obviously after the adoption of lockdown policy, and Chinese cabbage and pork prices in the food-consuming areas increased more obviously than those in food-producing areas. However, staple food prices have not risen significantly. Thirdly, the response of four kinds of food prices to the food security emergency policy is analyzed quantitatively and graphically using the food price volatility index and food price increase rate; we observed that the response of food prices to the food security emergency policy is related to the food types and regions. For food types, the fluctuation degree and increase in Chinese cabbage and pork prices decreased significantly after the adoption of the food security emergency policy. For regions, when the food security emergency policy was adopted, the food prices in the main food-consuming areas fluctuated more obviously than those in food-producing areas. Finally, we found that the implementation of the transport policy and the joint supply emergency policy in the main producing and consuming areas has played a very significant and positive role in stabilizing food prices.

Global grain production faces severe risks and challenges, such as the complex and volatile international situation and the frequent occurrence of extreme weather events. The effectiveness of national policies intended to support grain production security is becoming increasingly important. China has implemented a range of policies to promote grain production and increase the incomes of grain farmers. This study constructed a policy quantification model using a content analysis method to quantitatively analyze the various grain production support policies issued by the Chinese government. The application of sensitivity models and the difference-in-differences model to study the spatial response of China’s grain production to these policies enabled an assessment of the future policy trends of China, with the aim of enhancing grain production security. Grain production in the main grain-producing areas (MGPAs) responded best to the policy, the grain production–marketing-balanced areas (GPMBAs) were the second most responsive, and the main grain-marketing areas (MGMAs) responded to the policy to a lesser extent. The direct grain subsidy policy significantly contributed to an increase in grain production, especially in the MGPAs. The results of the study suggest that it would be more prudent for China’s future grain policy to guide the centralization of grain production toward the MGPAs. It will also be necessary to ensure that the government’s various support policies and subsidy funds are inclined toward the MGPAs, and the compensation mechanism should be improved to serve the interests of the MGPAs in terms of resources, ecology, and economy. This will help to enhance the comprehensive production capacity and production efficiency of the MGPAs, thereby guaranteeing China’s food security.

Recognizing regional economic resilience and its influencing factors under different shocks is necessary to promote stable regional economic development. The article analyzes the regional economic resilience of 31 Chinese provinces under three kinds of shocks, namely, financial crisis, economic downturn, and COVID-19, in terms of the resistance of regional economies to shocks, and examines spatial distribution and main influencing factors. The results of the study found that: (1) The characteristics of regional economic resilience under different shocks are different. During the financial crisis, the strong resilient provinces are distributed in the central and western and northern regions; during the economic downturn, the strong resilient provinces are mainly distributed in the western and central regions; during COVID-19, the strong resilient provinces are mainly distributed in the western and eastern coastal regions. The economic resilience of each province shows significant “high-high” and “low-low” spatial clustering characteristics during the economic downturn and the COVID-19. (2) The main influencing factors of economic resilience in different shocks are different. In the financial crisis, the magnitude of the contribution of the influencing factor is leading industry (0.283) > related diversity (0.197) > foreign trade dependence (0.190); during the economic downturn, the magnitude of the contribution of the influencing factor is population density (0.464) > leading industry (0.427) > related diversity (0.285); the magnitude of the contribution of the impact factor during the COVID-19 was related diversity (0.282) > unrelated diversity (0.274) > leading industry (0.272). (3) In the interaction of impact factors, the strongest explanatory power is found in related diversity, unrelated diversity, and leading industries, which represent the industrial structure. Therefore, there is a need to adjust the industrial structure and improve the regional economic resilience from the shock itself.

The COVID-19 pandemic has threatened human lives and caused an unprecedented impact on the global economy, notably on the global food system. COVID-19 itself and its policy response have severely affected food prices. This paper analyzes the short-term and long-term impacts of COVID-19 cases and policy responses (government response index (GRI), economic support index (ESI), stringency index (SI)) on food prices (Chinese cabbage price (CP), pork price (PP), flour price (FP), rice price (RP)) in China’s major food producing areas and major food selling areas through the autoregressive distribution lag error correction (ARDL-ECM) method and graphical analysis. as the purpose is to provide evidence for food security policy regulation to stabilize food prices and improve the food system’s ability to withstand similar emergencies in the future. This study finds that the short-term impact of COVID-19 policy responses on food prices is larger, while the long-term impact is smaller. The impacts of COVID-19 itself and COVID-19 policy responses on food prices vary by food type and food production and consumption region. For food type, the Chinese cabbage price was most affected by the COVID-19 policy response, followed by pork, and the staple food prices (flour price and rice price) were least affected. For regions, the Chinese cabbage price in food producing areas was more influenced by COVID-19 and the pork price in food selling areas was more influenced by COVID-19. For the single indexes, GRI and SI had uneven effects on different food prices. However, ESI had a significant positive impact on the Chinese cabbage price (CP) and pork price(PP), except in Guangdong and Hubei. Staple food prices were almost unaffected by COVID-19 confirmed cases and policy responses. Then, taking the Chinese cabbage price in Beijing, Shandong, and Hubei as an example, we find that “dynamic clearance” influenced the Chinese cabbage price in the short term, and Chinese cabbage price increased largely in the first stage. Finally, the reasons behind the research results of this paper are analyzed, and scientific suggestions are put forward for the implementation of food supply policies to ensure food price stability and food security in the face of similar pandemics in the future.

Food security is the foundation of sustainable human development, and the balance between food supply and demand in urban areas is highly important for promoting residents’ health and the sustainable development of cities. This paper takes the Urumqi Metropolitan Area (UMA), a typical oasis urban area, as the study area and uses the food production—demand gap indicator to assess the balance of food production and consumption in the region from 2000 to 2020 and projects food demand in 2030–2060. The results show, first, that residents’ food consumption is characterized by high carbohydrate, protein, and fat consumption, and that this put more pressure on food production. Second, different food consumption structures will have different impacts on food production, and the local food production capacity in UMA falls short of ensuring a balanced nutritional structure for residents. Third, food demand increases significantly in 2030–2060, and the pressure of population consumption structure on food production is much greater than that of population growth. Considering the environmental effects of food transportation and the loss of food nutrients, on the production side, the construction of the UMA should be accelerated by including Qitai County and Jimsar County in the UMA’s planning scope, strengthening city—regional connections, and improving the local food production and supply capacity of surrounding areas. On the consumption side, regional dietary guidelines should be developed based on local dietary culture and agricultural production conditions to help guide residents to adjust their dietary structures, thereby alleviating pressure on local food demand. Such measures are crucial for ensuring sufficient food supply and promoting balanced nutrition among the population.