Reducing agricultural carbon emissions is key to promoting the sustainable development of agriculture. Carbon sources play a significant role in the carbon emissions of China’s planting industry. Researching the principles of evolutionary trends of carbon sources regarding carbon emissions in China’s planting industry helps formulate scientific policies to control such emissions in the industry. This paper adopted an emission factor approach from the IPCC to estimate the CO₂ emissions of all kinds of carbon sources in China’s planting industry from 1997 to 2017. On the basis of the data, the principles of dynamic evolution in China’s planting industry and six carbon sources were analyzed by the kernel density estimation approach. Notably, the study discovered that carbon emissions peaked in 2015. In terms of the contributions of various carbon sources to the carbon emissions of the planting industry, sorted by chemical fertilizers, agricultural diesel oil, agricultural films, pesticides, agricultural irrigation, and seeding, their contribution rates were 60.82%, 13.95%, 12.88%, 9.83%, 1.88%, and 0.64%. At the same time, the kernel density results show that there was an increasing trend in carbon emissions across the whole of China’s planting industry and six kinds of carbon sources nationwide, with apparent “multipolarization”. From the perspective of various regions, the carbon emissions of chemical fertilizers, diesel oil, films, and pesticides in China’s planting industry had an evolutionary trend of multipolarization in central regions, while there was an evolutionary trend of monopolarization in eastern and western regions. The carbon emissions of seeding and irrigation had a similarly evolutionary trend in eastern, central, and western regions. Basically, they all had a double increase pattern in carbon emissions and regional differences. Therefore, China’s government needs a target to set up long-term mechanisms to ensure a stable and orderly reduction in carbon emissions in the planting industry, leading its development from the traditional planting industry to a climate-smart planting industry.

A precise understanding of the carbon dynamics of agricultural land use is essential for advancing China’s “dual carbon” goals and promoting sustainable rural development. Drawing on panel datasets for 31 Chinese provinces over the period 1997–2022, this study comprehensively analyzes the spatiotemporal evolution, regional disparities, and transition dynamics of agricultural carbon capture and emissions. Using a combination of the emission factor method, the Dagum Gini coefficient, kernel density estimation, and Markov chain models, the study finds that China’s total agricultural carbon capture has continued to increase, yet regional disparities are widening, with the central region leading and the northeastern region lagging. Meanwhile, agricultural carbon emissions exhibit a “strong west, weak east” spatial pattern and demonstrate a high degree of club convergence. Club convergence refers to the phenomenon where regions with similar initial levels converge to the same steady-state over the long run, while remaining persistently different from other regions. The net carbon effect exhibits a dual structure of carbon surplus zones and carbon deficit zones: 23 provinces act as carbon surplus zones, while 8 provinces are carbon deficit zones, primarily located in ecologically fragile or special-function regions. These findings highlight the spatial heterogeneity, path dependence, and policy sensitivity of carbon effects from agricultural land use. Accordingly, the study proposes differentiated policy recommendations, including region-specific carbon management strategies, the establishment of a unified agricultural carbon trading system, and the integration of technological and institutional innovations to achieve a balanced and low-carbon agricultural transformation.