Changes and Influencing Factors of Maize Production Pattern in China

Since the founding of new China, the maize production pattern took on characteristic of “northern expansion and western movement”: there were great changes in ranking of main producing provinces; southern planting area gradually shrank, while central and northern planting area gradually expanded; apart from traditional main producing regions such as northeastern, north China, and southwestern regions, Shanxi-Shaanxi region and northwest region are gradually forming. To further analyze factors promoting changes in maize production pattern, based on 1987-2013 panel data, we carried our empirical study and obtained five influencing factors: resource endowment, economic environment, market environment, technical conditions, and policies. Per capita farmland, multiple cropping index, water conservancy and irrigation, and benefit cost ratio, and traffic and transportation policies exert positive effect, non-agricultural employment level exerts negative effect, and the significance of natural disasters, market price, and science and technology are inadequate.