Climate Extremes and Land Transfer Decisions Among Grain Farmers: Evidence from China’s Rural Fixed Observation Points

Global warming is increasing the frequency of extreme weather events and threatening agricultural production and food security. As land is a core input in grain production, adjustments in land allocation represent a key adaptation pathway. Using national fixed-point survey data from China’s Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs and multi-dimensional fixed-effects framework, we examine how extreme weather shapes grain farmers’ land transfer (rental) decisions. Linear probability models (LPMs) are employed for binary transfer decisions, and standard linear models for transfer area, both controlling for year fixed effects, regional fixed effects and their interactive effects. We find that extreme weather discourages grain farmers from renting land and encourages them to rent out land. Farmers with stronger resource endowments attenuate this response—showing smaller reductions in land renting and smaller increases in land renting-out—consistent with factor substitution, asset specificity, and risk-buffering effects. Market and policy factors both moderate the extreme weather–land transfer relationship but in opposite directions: market factors primarily ease labor mobility constraints, whereas policy factors focus on stabilizing agricultural production. The effects also vary substantially by gender, income, and region.