Human capital is the key factor for building farmers' livelihoods and examining farming households' livelihood strategy is important for promoting livelihood transformation and rural revitalization. Taking Liangshan Prefecture of Sichuan Province in the mountainous area of southwest China as the case study area, this study measured the impact of human capital on farming households' livelihood strategy by using the survey data from 508 farmers in 2018 and applying regression models. The results show: human capital is an important factor of farmers' livelihood choices in mountainous areas, and different types of human capital have different impacts on farmers' livelihood strategy, with clear spatial differences. Education level and health condition have positive effects on off-farm livelihood strategy, with most significant impacts in the high mountain villages, followed by the semi-mountain villages, and health condition has no significant effect on farmers' livelihood choices in the river valley villages. Off-farm skill training has a significant positive impact on off-farm livelihood strategy choices, with most significant impact in the high mountain villages, followed by the semi-mountain and river valley villages; agricultural skill training has a negative impact on off-farm livelihood strategy choices, with most significant impact in the river valley villages, followed by the semi-mountain villages, and agricultural skill training has no significant effect on farmers' livelihood choices in the high mountain villages. Young adult labor force tend to choose off-farm livelihood, and the aging problem of farming population is getting worse, with the high mountain villages being the most significant, followed by the semi-mountain villages, and the river valley villages being less obvious. Income gaps between farm and off-farm livelihood types is the fundamental reason affecting farmers' livelihood choices, and poor rural public services and lack of development opportunity are important reasons that affect farmers' livelihood choices. Finally, based on the above conclusions, this article explored the dialectical relationship between human capitals, labor off-farm employment, and rural development and its policy implications.

With the continuous development of agricultural commercialization in China, traditional uncovered farmlands have been gradually replaced, the area of plastic tunnels in the suburbs of big cities expands rapidly, and the transformation of agricultural land use to "plastic tunnels" has become more common. Along with this development, farmers in the suburbs of big cities have gradually changed from the traditional "self-sufficient" farmers to the market-oriented "new professional farmers". However, so far there has been little research on the role of new professional farmers in the transformation of agricultural land use in the suburbs of big cities. In order to analyze the influence of "new professional farmers" on the transformation of agricultural land use, based on the questionnaire survey primary data of 291 farmers in eight districts of Nanjing City in 2018 and secondary data, this study constructed a Logistic regression model from the perspective of new professional farmer influences and studied the impact of new professional farmers on the transformation of plastic tunnels on a micro scale. The results show that: 1) Compared with other types of farmers, new professional farmers are the fundamental driving factor for the transformation of suburban farmland use and can significantly promote the transformation of suburban farmland use towards plastic tunnels. Holding all other variables constant, the possibility of plastic tunnels cultivation of migrant professional farmers is about 4.7 times that of other types of farmers. 2) Age of the new professional farmers, years of farming, and scale of operation are important factors affecting the transformation of plastic tunnels. The older the farmers are, the less likely they are to convert to plant cropping in plastic tunnels; the longer the number of years of farming, and the larger the scale of operation, the greater the possibility of converting to the use of plastic tunnels. 3) For all farmers who participated in the survey, sales proportion, annual net profit per unit of agriculture production, and terrain factors have a significant positive effect on the transformation of plastic tunnels.

In-depth research on rural land use change and settlement development is of great significance for exploring the optimization of regional rural system, promoting urban-rural integration, and rural sustainable development. This study took the Nianzhuang gully basin in Yan'an City of Shaanxi Province, China as an example. Based on software technologies such as ENVI and GIS and combining Landsat satellite images, the Markov chain model, and humanistic field survey, this study examined the land use change of typical villages in the loess hilly and gully region and its implications for regional rural transformation and development from the perspectives of change and transfer of land-use types, spatial change of construction land, and social responses. The results show that: 1) With the implementation of a series of ecological engineering measures, the ecological land cover of the Nianzhuang gully basin has been significantly improved. This is mainly represented by the conversion of a large number of slope farmland and dispersed ecological land into forest land, as a result of which the proportion of forest land area increased from 32.34% in 2009 to 50.88% in 2018. 2) Under the influence of the social and economic progress and the development of Yan'an New City, the construction land of the Nianzhuang gully basin has been expanding into the southeast and southwest of the basin. The area of construction land has increased by nearly 75% in the past 10 years. 3) Due to the leading role of human activities, the villages in the loess hilly and gully region are transforming towards ecological and intensive use of land. The results of this study can provide a new reference for an in-depth understanding of regional rural system structure and optimization in the loess hilly and gully region.