Practices for rural population aging in China: Land-based pension

• Published in: Habitat international 2024-09, Vol.151, p.103136, Article 103136
• Main Authors: Guo, Yuanzhi, Wang, Jieyong
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Human-land relationship; Land system reform; Land-based pension; Market mechanism; Rural population aging; Rural restructuring
• ISSN: 0197-3975
• DOI: 10.1016/j.habitatint.2024.103136

In recent decades, rural China is aging rapidly. Population aging implies that people's role in economic activities is transforming from "producer-consumer" to "consumer-producer". Coupled with the weakening of intergenerational relationships and the disintegration of the intergenerational division of labor caused by demographic transition, inefficient land use is common in rural China, making it difficult to sustain the traditional family pension model based on the land. Promoted by land system reform, the practice of land-based pension based on "the separation of the three rights" of the land has solved the problem of labor shortage in agricultural production through the introduction of market mechanisms, and reshaped rural human-land relationship. Meanwhile, it revitalizes rural land resources through the assetization and capitalization of land resources, meeting the increasingly transformed and upgraded pension demands of rural elderly. The case study of Lüyi Town in Shandong Province shows that land-based pension has increased the livelihood capital of rural elderly, improved their living conditions, and effectively solved the problem of rural pension while promoting agricultural and rural modernization. As an important supplement to the existing rural pension system, the practice of land-based pension is an exploration of a positive response to rural population ageing, and can be promoted through systematic institutional design in some of the economically better-off regions of China. •Population aging drives people to gradually shift from "producer-consumer" to "consumer-producer".•Land-based pension reshapes rural human-land relationship through the introduction of market mechanisms.•The practice of Lüyi Town shows that land-based pension has effectively solved the problem of rural pension.•Land-based pension is a practice to actively respond to rural population aging and deserves to be further promoted.