Abstract:
Land consolidation is an important means to activate natural capital in poverty-stricken areas, as well as being a significant contributor to poverty alleviation efforts and development work. The poverty alleviation effect has been achieved through local practice in China. In this paper, a typical project area of land consolidation in the deeply poverty-stricken areas of Southern Xinjiang was taken as an example to study the poverty-alleviation characteristics of the comprehensive benefits of land consolidation in the study area. The matched multiple difference model(PSM-DID) was used for empirical testing, and the poverty-alleviation characteristics of the comprehensive benefits of land consolidation before and after the implementation of land consolidation, between the implemented area and the unimplemented area were compared and analyzed. The results showed that the land consolidation project had a significant impact on the farmers’ operating income and property income through estimation of DID, PSM and PSM-DID. Among them, the estimated value of the matching multiple difference of the average operating income per household of the two types of peasant households was 963 yuan, and the estimated value of the matching multiple difference of the average property income per household was 1 736 yuan, which passed the significance test of 5%. Secondly, the coefficient of whether the land was transferred at the economic level was 0.142>0. At the same time, the coefficient of intensive use of residential land at the social level was 0.012>0, and the coefficient of the number of migrant workers was 0.142>0, which indicated that land consolidation had a poverty-alleviating effect at the social level. The change rate coefficient of shelterbelt density at the ecological level was 0.362>0, and the change rate coefficient of land reclamation was 0.019>0, indicating that land consolidation also had the benefit and poverty effect at the ecological level. On the whole, the target beneficiary groups of land consolidation, namely farmers in poor areas, benefit significantly, and the comprehensive benefits of land consolidation are undoubtedly beneficial to the poor.