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Abstract
This study, based on the data of China’s agricultural census of 1997, focuses on
the land distribution among rural households and its effects on crop production structure
and employment of labor and capital. The Census data show that the size of holdings
surprisingly differs among households, and land rental activities has started to play an
important role in land allocation. Grain production accounts for 80% of total sown area
for each household group, indicating that self-sufficiency in grains production is still an
important factor to farmers.
Family members are a dominant source for China's agricultural labor force,
regardless of the size of land held in each household. Machinery use in crop production
is still not popular, while the scale of land held by households has an impact on the use of
machinery in crop production. Moreover, the small land holdings of agriculture may
lower labor productivity, even though there are more non-agricultural employment
activities among these small scale households.