Grassland Restoration Increases Agricultural Yields through Microclimate Regulation

Liu, Min and Huang, Kaixing and Wang, Jizhe and Wuepper, David (2025): Grassland Restoration Increases Agricultural Yields through Microclimate Regulation.

Abstract

Ecosystem restoration is often perceived as competing with agricultural production, yet this perception neglects potential synergies emerging from biophysical feedbacks. Here, we demonstrate that large-scale grassland restoration under China’s Grassland Ecological Compensation Policy (GECP) significantly enhances maize yields by regulating local microclimate. Using a staggered difference-in-differences design with county-level panel data, we show that restored grasslands reduced average growing-season temperatures by approximately 0.11℃ and increased precipitation by 11.48mm, thereby suppressing extreme heat and drought during critical reproductive stages. These changes extended the maize reproductive growth period by 0.93 days, elevating yields by 7.76% (0.437t/ha) and reducing crop failure risk by 25.9%. Economically, the yield gains alone offset over 80% of program costs within five years, and the additional production could alleviate nearly 10% of China's maize import deficit in the Northern Spring Maize Region. Our findings overturn the conventional trade-off narrative between conservation and agri culture, positioning ecosystem restoration as a scalable strategy for climate resilient food security.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: ecosystem restoration, agricultural production, climate change adaptation, grassland, China, cost-benefit analysis
• Subjects: Q - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics ; Environmental and Ecological Economics > Q1 - Agriculture > Q15 - Land Ownership and Tenure ; Land Reform ; Land Use ; Irrigation ; Agriculture and Environment; Q - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics ; Environmental and Ecological Economics > Q1 - Agriculture > Q18 - Agricultural Policy ; Food Policy; Q - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics ; Environmental and Ecological Economics > Q5 - Environmental Economics > Q54 - Climate ; Natural Disasters and Their Management ; Global Warming; Q - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics ; Environmental and Ecological Economics > Q5 - Environmental Economics > Q57 - Ecological Economics: Ecosystem Services ; Biodiversity Conservation ; Bioeconomics ; Industrial Ecology

References

1.Biasi, Barbara and Heather Sarsons, “Flexible wages, bargaining, and the gender gap,” The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 2022, 137 (1), 215–266.

2.Bright, Ryan M, Edouard Davin, Thomas O’Halloran, Julia Pongratz, Kaiguang Zhao, and Alessandro Cescatti, “Local temperature response to land cover and management change driven by non-radiative processes,” Nature Climate Change, 2017, 7 (4), 296–302.

3. Cai, Zongwu, Ying Fang, Ming Lin, and Jia Su, “Inferences for a partially varying coefficient model with endogenous regressors,” Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, 2019, 37 (1), 158–170.

4. Callaway, Brantly and Pedro HC Sant’Anna, “Difference-in-differences with multiple time periods,” Journal of econometrics, 2021, 225 (2), 200–230.

5. Chen, Shuai and Binlei Gong, “Response and adaptation of agriculture to climate change: Evidence from China,” Journal of Development Economics, 2021, 148, 102557. publisher: Elsevier.