Temporal And Spatial Pattern And Influencing Factors Of Virtual Water Import Of Grain Crops In China

Water security and food security are the focal issues of the long-term stable development of an area.China is seriously short of water resources,and the per capita water resources are much lower than the world average.Water shortages occur frequently in some river basins and provinces.At the same time,there are many hidden dangers to China’s food security,such as tightening of water and land resources,and greater dependence and concentration on foreign sources.High,major disasters and adverse effects of public health events,etc.In this context,the emergence of virtual water strategy provides a new choice for solving the shortage of water resources and ensuring national food supply.Research on the temporal and spatial pattern and influencing factors of China’s grain crop virtual water import will provide important guidance for deepening international grain trade cooperation and promoting the effective implementation of virtual water strategy.First of all,the article systematically reviews the central concepts and theoretical basis of virtual water for grain crops,summarize the relevant research results in recent years,and estimates the virtual water imports of China’s four grain crops from 2006 to2020 on this basis.Construct a total-region-product three-dimensional perspective to analyze its import structure;secondly,the paper uses grain crop virtual water import dependence,import concentration,diversification index and equilibrium index to analyze the time series dynamic characteristics of China’s grain crop virtual water imports,and the spatial pattern evolution of virtual water import of grain crops in China is revealed by using fragmentation index and exploratory spatial data analysis;finally,we separately analyze the economics of scale,geographic distance,factor endowments,technological progress,climate change,institutional environment,and policy effects.A qualitative analysis of the influencing factors of China’s grain crop virtual water imports was carried out,and the two-way fixed effects model and the Poisson pseudo-maximum likelihood estimation method were used to carry out empirical tests.The research results show that:(1)China’s grain crop virtual water imports show a fluctuating growth trend,with certain regional and product differences.In general,China’s grain crop virtual water imports from 2006 to 2020 showed a “slow rise” trend.The virtual water imports in some years fluctuated occasionally but did not affect the overall growth.From a regional perspective,China’s The countries in the Americas have the largest amount of virtual water for imported grain crops,followed by European and Asian countries.The amount of virtual water imported for grain crops from Australia and African countries is relatively small.From a product perspective,China’s soybean imports have the largest amount of virtual water,followed by wheat and corn,and rice has the least amount of virtual water imports.(2)In terms of time,China’s grain crops have a high degree of dependence and concentration on virtual water imports,most of which belong to the "highly concentrated oligopolistic" and "extremely oligopolistic" types.They are easily restricted by large import sources and have obvious characteristics of diversification.,The level of equilibrium is weak;in terms of space,China’s grain crop virtual water imports tend to be homogenized,but the degree of fragmentation is weak,and the characteristics of absolute uniform distribution have not yet appeared.It has a positive global spatial autocorrelation,but there is a weakening The risk of local spatial agglomeration is still under development.(3)The level of bilateral economic development,geographical distance,the advantages of the endowment of water and land resources of the importing country,the carbon dioxide emissions and forest area of the importing country,the level of trade liberalization and government expenditures of the importing country,and the bilateral accession to the world The trade organization has a significant impact on China’s grain crop virtual water imports.Among them,the level of bilateral economic development,the advantages of water and land resources of the import source country,the government expenditure level of the import source country,and the bilateral accession to the World Trade Organization show a positive impact.Distance,the carbon dioxide emissions of the import source country,forest area and the level of trade liberalization show negative effects.According to the above research conclusions,based on the background of water security and food security,this paper puts forward policy suggestions to alleviate China’s water shortage and promote the prosperity and development of China’s grain trade:(1)Implement a virtual water strategy based on national conditions and build sustainable use of agricultural water resources New model;(2)Based on the new national food security strategy,adjust and optimize China’s grain import strategy;(3)Build a food security system and a water security maintenance system under the new development pattern of double circulation.