关键词: 梯度城镇化, 村庄, 人口迁徙, 上杭

Abstract:

In 2011, the proportion of China′s urban population exceeded 50%. In the past 30 years, urbanization has contributed enormously to economic growth and modernization in China. For China,the primary strategic task of economic and social development is to continue to increase the level of urbanization,and manage the orderly transfer of the rural population to the cities. The government announced that China′s future development roadmap is a ‘new type of urbanization’, which requires the coordinated development of cities and towns. This article generalizes four gradients of migration destination of rural population, and proposes the concept of ‘gradient urbanization’. Based on the 311 village questionnaires of Shanghang County in Fujian province, we identify the factors for different gradient migration. The result shows: 1) The size of village and population outflow are negatively correlated. A 1% increase in the population size of the village would cause a 0.4% decrease in the outflow proportion of the population. There is a significant distance attenuation in the migration from villages to the county. 2) Villages with high elderly dependency ratios are more likely to lose their villagers, as the aged lower the migration cost to the county for the young people. In contrast, the villages with high child-age dependency ratios are less likely to lose their villagers. 3) Education is an important driving force for urbanization. As educational resources gradually become concentrated in the county, an increasing number of young parents choose to move to the county, where their children can receive a better primary education. Furthermore, significant evidence has been found to show that the villagers with high human capital are more inclined to migrate to the prefecture-level city.

Key words: gradient urbanization, village, migration, Shanghang