Modelling environment and poverty factors for sustainable agriculture in the Three Gorges Reservoir Regions of China

Abstract

Modelling is a good tool for understanding the complex interactions of the agricultural systems; however, few studies have used a combined method of text mining and system dynamics to analyse and simulate the agricultural system. We propose the topic modelling-system dynamics modelling (TM-SDM) analytical framework to extract, synthesise, and dynamically simulate the factors of land management, disaster, pollution, and poverty in the system. Specifically, 1,598 English language publications were collected to analyse the main concerns and conceptual structure of the sustainable development in the case study area based on topic modelling. Historical data from 2000 to 2014 are used for simulation and prediction based on system dynamics modelling, exploring and comparing different policy scenarios. The results show that policies about education and training, sewage treatment, infrastructure construction, and soil erosion control would help poverty reduction significantly. Sewage treatment policy reduces the incidence of human disease and sewage discharge significantly.Education and training policy has the greatest impact on the improvement of poverty reduction and yield of crops, and the environmental protection scenario has the best performance on maintaining the cultivated land. The balanced development scenario benefits both the poverty reduction and environmental protection concurrently.Focussing on a systems approach to improve the sustainability of agriculture, this paper could have a positive impact on the development and implementation of sustainable agricultural systems. The TM-SDM analysis and modelling framework that we proposed has a generic nature, which could be applied to the further research and decision-making on sustainable agriculture and other fields involving complex systems.

A Theoretical Framework for Understanding the Spatial Coupling between Poverty and the Environment: A Case Study from China

“…Sustainable agricultural development is one technique to reverse the vicious cycle of resource degradation and poverty (Cheng et al, 2018a). In this case study, most of the extreme poor are living in rural areas, with agriculture being an important part of their livelihoods (Croppenstedt et al, 2018; Millar and Photakoun, 2008).…”

“…Since the 1980s, studies on the relationship between environment and poverty has become a hot topic in academia, and the interaction between these two factors has been widely recognized (Dasgupta et al, 2005; Shuai et al, 2017; Cheng et al, 2018a). In addition, poverty enhances livelihood risk for the poor.…”

Dynamic Evolution of the Ecological Carrying Capacity of Poverty-Stricken Karst Counties Based on Ecological Footprints: A Case Study in Northwestern Guangxi, China

“…Since the 1980s, the research on poverty, degradation of ecological environment, and their interrelation, has become a hot topic in academic circles. Scholars have carried out a lot of research work around the interaction between these two factors [35][36][37]. Poverty alleviation and ecological environment protection as an important part of sustainable development [38,39], especially in poor areas and ecologically vulnerable areas in developing countries, are the core content [40].…”

Multiattribute decision making for the assessment of disaster resilience in the Three Gorges Reservoir Area

“…Therefore, disaster resilience assessment for the Three Gorges Reservoir Area is very essential to locate any weaknesses, which would help to enhance its disaster resilience. However, previous studies on the area mainly focused on geological disasters (Bai et al 2010), environmental change (Tan and Yao 2006), and poverty (Xu et al 2017, Cheng et al 2018, Peng et al 2019, and comparative studies on disaster resilience in a holistic and comprehensive manner are few.…”