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Abstract
The overall aim of the present paper is to better understand the evolution of tubewell
ownership in the North China Plain, especially focusing on the factors that determine
ownership and its effect on production. Based on a random sample of 30 villages in
three counties in the Hai River Basin, our results show that collectively owned tubewells
have been gradually privatised. The analyses demonstrate that increasing water and
land scarcity and policy intervention (mainly fiscal and financial subsidies for tubewell
investment) leads to the observed shifts in tubewell ownership patterns. The results also
show that the privatisation of tubewells has affected cropping patterns in the North
China Plain. When villages shift towards private tubewells, farmers move into more
water-sensitive and high-value crops. Privatisation, however, has no negative effect on
crop productivity in the present sample. Importantly, the evolution of tubewell ownership
in the villages studied does not accelerate the fall of the groundwater table.