Progress and prospects of Geography in responding to China’s agricultural and rural policies

Since the new century, the successive release of China’s No.1 central document has shown the innovative path of reform and development in agriculture and rural areas. Geography has achieved rapid development in supporting the decision-making on agriculture, rural areas, and farmers by adhering to the tenet of serving the national strategies. Here we reviewed the evolution of agricultural and rural policies in China based on China’s No.1 central document from 2004 to 2024, examined the geographical research that has responded to and promoted it, and proposed future priorities and directions, to encourage the development of Agricultural and Rural Geography and better support decision-making on national strategies. The results show that: 1) China’s agricultural and rural policies have evolved through three periods, namely the construction of new countryside and urban-rural coordinated development (2004—2012), the comprehensively deepening rural reforms and urban-rural equalized development (2013—2017), and the rural revitalization and urban-rural integrated development (2018—2024), which are characterized by problem orientation, systematic thinking, and comprehensive goals. 2) Focusing on human-earth system and sustainable development, Geography has proposed and developed theoretical framework of rural areal multi-body system, element-structure-function, process-mechanism-pattern, main function zoning-dominant type classification-principal purpose gradation, and space-organization-industry reconstruction. These frameworks address the coupling and cascading of elements, dynamic evolution and transformation, and optimal regulation of rural areal system. 3) Significant geographical research progress has been made on modern agricultural development and geographical engineering, new countryside construction and hollow villages consolidation, urban-rural transformation and rural restructuring, targeted poverty alleviation, and rural revitalization and urban-rural integration by giving full play to Geography’s disciplinary advantages of comprehensiveness, regionalism, and practicability. 4) The research object of Agricultural and Rural Geography is shifting from the single agricultural system, multifunctional rural system, to the integrated urban-rural system; the research paradigm is shifting from the description of rural element patterns, exploration of rural areal system process and transformation mechanisms, to the simulation and forecast of urban-rural integration scenarios; the research approach is shifting from traditional statistical surveys, multisource detection, to intelligent decision-making. In the future, Geography should seize the opportunity to conduct comprehensive, coherent, interdisciplinary research on “science-technology-engineering” to support the decision-making on rural revitalization and modernization of agriculture and rural areas.