China's Agricultural Reform, Technical Efficiency And Decomposition Of Productivity Change

Agricultural reform beginning in 1978 has greatly improved the enthusiasm of agricultural production, and since then China's agricultural production has gained rapid development. But then the growth rate of agricultural production output began to slow down, and showed periodicity and volatility. In view of the development of agricultural production, the government implemented a series of agricultural reform measures which aimed at promoting the development of agricultural production. The influence of agricultural reform on agricultural output is mainly reflected in two aspects. One is the promotion of technological progress, and the other is the advancement of technical efficiency. When input factors keep within certain conditions, the growth of agricultural total factor productivity is the main source of agricultural output growth, and technological progress and technical efficiency are the two important aspects of it. In the stage of the agricultural reform, are there any differences in the agricultural production technology? How far has the agricultural production technical efficiency gone? Which is the main source of China's agricultural total factor productivity, technological progress or technical efficiency improvement? In different stages of agricultural reform, how far has growth in total factor productivity gone? And what's pushing forward the growth? Is agricultural taxation reform effective in promoting China's agricultural technology efficiency? The research on these issues has strong theoretical and practical significance for further guidance in the agricultural reform of China.Technical efficiency of agricultural measuring and the decomposition of total factor productivity change mainly adopt the method of panel data stochastic frontier analysis. Firstly, the article systematically introduces panel stochastic frontier model and its estimation method. Although the set form of the linear panel data model assums that all producers use the same production technology, yet in the operation of the real economy, different producers use different technologies. To better characterize the technology differences, this paper discusses the threshold estimation, testing, and estimation of technical efficiency of the threshold panel stochastic frontier model. And, in order to study the effect of exogenous variables on technical efficiency, this paper introduces and compares two-step estimation and one-step estimation of the exogenous model of technical efficiency. Secondly, this paper adopts the stochastic frontier analysis method. Based on different stages of agricultural reform and regional differences in production technology, this paper compares China's agricultural technical efficiency in different agricultural reform period, reveals the changes in agricultural total factor productivity, and studies the impacts the agricultural policy on the production technical efficiency.Considering the regional differences in production technology, this paper separately measured the technical efficiency of agricultural production of different stages using time-invariant stochastic frontier panel threshold model. The results showed that in 1979-1984, China agricultural production technical efficiency has been greatly improved; agricultural production technology didn't differ greatly among regions. In 1985-1991, China agricultural production technology efficiency was most effective. Some areas that relied on capital investment improved the production technology. The agricultural reform policies of this phase were the most effective ones. In 1992-1999, China agricultural production efficiency began to decline, and the gap of agricultural production technology became widening. In 1999-2005, agricultural production efficiency further declined, and the differences of agricultural production technologies started to narrow down.According to difference stages of agricultural reform, considering the difference of the production technology of the eastern, central and western regions, the article measures agricultural technology efficiency using stochastic production frontier model, and decomposes agricultural total factor productivity. China's total factor productivity growth was mainly due to technological progress, the volatility of total factor productivity comes from changes in agricultural technology, and regional differences in total factor productivity mainly comes from technological progress. Technology of the eastern, Central, Western regions progresses in a steady way. Technological progress in the eastern region is the fastest; the growth rate of technological change in the western region is far lower than that of the eastern and central regions. The total factor productivity of the eastern region is essentially higher than that of the national average; the total factor productivity in the western region is basically lower than that of the national average. The total factor productivity of stage of agricultural reform of the four regions is quite different. The rate of technological change of the fourth stage of the agricultural reform is fastest; the first phase of agricultural reform is the slowest. The change rate of technical efficiency of the first phase of the agricultural reform is the fastest; the fourth phase of the agricultural reform is the slowest.Using stochastic frontier model and the one-step estimation of the technical efficiency exogenous model, the article analyzes exogenous determinants of the technical efficiency of China's agricultural reform. Agricultural tax reform has significantly improved agricultural technical efficiency and it is effective in promoting agricultural production. The price of agricultural production material has obvious negative effects on agricultural technical efficiency, while it has significant positive impact on the agricultural technical efficiency. Rural per capita net income has a positive effect on the agricultural technical efficiency. The higher the average years of schooling in rural areas is, the better agricultural technical efficiency will be enhanced. The higher the population of high school education in rural population is, the higher the agricultural technical efficiency is. Economic location factor has significant positive effects on the agricultural technical efficiency.