Contemporarily, the promotion and application of straw-to-field technology plays an important role in developing high-quality green agriculture, alleviating agricultural non-point source pollution and realizing the double carbon target. As the main subject of straw-to-field, a farmers’ willingness directly determines their straw-to-field behavior. To explore the influencing factors of farmers’ straw-to-field willingness and to improve the comprehensive utilization level of straw, this paper researches the relationship between government regulation, farmers’ subject cognition and straw-to-field willingness based on the survey data of 733 farmers in Heilongjiang province, and it examines the mediating role of farmers’ cognition in the process of government regulation affecting farmers’ willingness of straw-to-field. The results evidence that policy incentives and administrative constraints affect farmers’ willingness of straw-to-field by influencing ecological and technical cognition. However, farmers’ cognition of the cost and benefit of straw-to-field is biased; thus, this factor cannot effectively transform the willingness of straw-to-field into action.

Against the backdrop of the “storing grain in land and technology” strategy and pressing food security challenges, understanding biased technological progress in grain production is crucial. This study constructs a three-factor Constant Elasticity of Substitution (CES) production function—incorporating agricultural machinery, chemical fertilizer, and labor—and employs a normalized supply-side system with Nonlinear Seemingly Unrelated Regression (NLSUR) to analyze biased technological progress across 26 Chinese grain-producing provinces from 2004 to 2023. Total factor productivity (TFP) is also decomposed to assess this progress’s contribution. The results indicate that first, technological progress generally evolves along a “machinery–fertilizer–labor” path. Recently, the primary driver shifted from machinery to fertilizers, aligning with fertilizer reduction and green development policies. Second, TFP growth exhibits phased characteristics, declining during the post-agricultural tax reform period (2005–2013) and rising amid supply-side structural reforms and the “storing grain in technology” strategy (2014–2023). Third, marketization, demand, and digitalization promote fertilizer-oriented progress; specialization drives machinery-oriented progress; and road infrastructure facilitates labor-oriented progress. These results offer empirical evidence for policy evaluation and guidance for optimizing factor allocation, advancing the green transition, and safeguarding food security.