What Determines China's Agricultural Nonpoint Source Pollution? An Improved LMDI Decomposition Analysis.

Using the logarithmic mean Divisia index method, this paper decomposes changes in China's agricultural nonpoint source pollution into five factors: emission intensity, production scale, labor intensification, urbanization, and population-scale factors. Moreover, we further explore the contribution of each factor at different agricultural policy stages and the impact of subsidies on emissions. Our main findings show that emission intensity is the main restraining factor of pollution, while production scale plays the greatest effect on aggravating loads. The incentive effect of agricultural subsidies reduces emissions, but the expansion of government fiscal expenditures will lead to an increase. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]