Industrial prosperity is the foundation of rural revitalization. Taking the 552 agricultural industry demonstration towns (AIDTs) as the research object, this paper explores the spatial layout and influence mechanism of AIDTs in China. The research is of great significance to the layout of China’s agricultural industry and the revitalization of the rural agricultural industry. This paper adopts the ArcGIS 10.3 spatial analysis method to reveal the spatial distribution characteristics, density characteristics, spatial complexity, and spatial correlation of AIDTs in China. (1) The spatial distribution of AIDTs tends to be condensed distribution with remarkable spatial differentiation. (2) The kernel density of China’s AIDTs is characterized by multiple independent mononuclear centers, secondary centered bands, and sporadic distribution. (3) The AIDTs system is characterized by scaleless areas, significant fractal features, and complexity of spatial structure. (4) The AIDTs belong to positive spatial correlation present different patterns of cold and hot spots with the more concentrated spatial distribution. The research indicates that the spatial distribution pattern of China’s AIDTs is highly consistent with the distribution of major grain-producing areas. It is mainly determined by factors such as good natural conditions, convenient water resources, and good regional advantages and continuously implemented agricultural industry reform. With the “three changes” reform (i.e. change resources into assets, funds into shares, and farmers into shareholders) proposed by Liupanshui City in Guizhou Province in March 2015 as a strategy, take the agricultural industry scale development model and adheres to the guidance of the agricultural industry to contribute to rural revitalization. The research results are of essential guiding significance for China’s agricultural industry reform, agricultural economic development, rural revitalization, and the characteristics of agricultural industry layout.

The active utilization and inheritance of agricultural heritage cannot be separated from the support of relevant government policies. This study combined the bibliometric method and content analysis method to analyze the agricultural heritage protection and development policies based on the government’s 410 agricultural heritage official documents and constructed a six-dimensional analysis framework of document release form, release subject, release quantity, document relevance, document type, and document content. The results show that the form and subject of document release are diversified; the number of documents released has an approximate inverted “U”-type characteristic; the number of documents formulated specifically for agricultural heritage is relatively small (21.46%); and information documents and guidance documents are more favored by the government than incentive documents. The discussion of the document content demonstrates that the excavation and application of agricultural heritage are worthy of further improvement; the economic value is widely used in the multifunctional utilization of agricultural heritage; and farmers, enterprises, scientific research institutions, and governments are all crucial participants in the management of agricultural heritage. Some problems remain in the government’s management of agricultural heritage, such as producing too few targeted documents and the insufficient coverage of the documents that have been produced thus far.

The dominant livelihood types of farm households have become increasingly differentiated in recent years, which has attracted the attention of researchers. Identifying the characteristics and driving factors of household livelihood differentiation is of great significance for revealing man-land relationship and policy making. Based on the interview data of farm households in typical villages in key ecological function areas of Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region in China, we analyzed the pattern of the dominant diversified livelihood types and the livelihood characteristics among different farm households. Then we assessed the driving forces of livelihood diversification by optimal scaling regression. The results indicated that: (1) In the study area, the dominant livelihood types show two trends of agriculturally dominant livelihood (accounting for 53.07%) and non-agriculturally dominant livelihood (accounting for 46.93%). Moreover, farm households in the agro-pastoral areas are mainly agriculturally dominated (accounting for 75.68%), while farm households in the mountainous areas are mainly non-agriculturally dominated (accounting for 66.93%). (2) The labor allocation and income source of different types of farm households are consistent with their dominant livelihood types. The farm households with agriculturally dominant livelihoods have more natural resources than those with non-agriculturally dominant livelihoods. In terms of housing conditions, farm households with agriculturally dominant livelihoods are inferior to those with non-agriculturally dominant livelihoods. (3) The farm labor, dependency ratio, agricultural income, supplemental income and locational conditions have negative impacts on the non-agricultural trend of farm household livelihood decisions, while off-farm labor, non-farm income, education level and the per capita amount of compensation have significant positive impacts on it.

Traditional rural homegarden agroforestry systems in the Chengdu Plain of China are often referred to as “Linpan” in Chinese, which integrates the landscape of ecological functions and human production activities. In recent years, due to the influences of urbanization and the aging population, the Linpan landscape has changed dramatically. Clarifying the factors which influence Linpan landscape evolution is a critical way to improve rural landscape renovation. Through oral history interviews, the deep-seated factors driving the evolution of the Linpan landscape form from 1949 to 2020 are explored using the grounded theory. The results show that in the process of Linpan landscape evolution, beneficiary groups, the material basis, and cultural characteristics are the prerequisites for changing the Linpan settlement landscape. The demand of production and life and government-led behavior are the two main influencing factors, and landscape change is the final result. The demand of production and life from the residents is the primary internal driving force of landscape change, while government-led behavior is the main external driving force of settlement development and evolution. The nature of the main driving forces behind the evolution of the Linpan landscape in the Chengdu Plain can be divided into three stages. (1) From 1949 to 1980, it was characterized as a balancing of government forces and social forces. (2) From 1981 to 1993, it was characterized by social forces suppressing government forces. (3) From 1994 to 2020, it was characterized as a stalemate between the government and social forces. From the perspective of the evolution of the Linpan settlement landscape, the traditional Linpan form and settlement layout have been unable to meet the new requirements of the rural social and economic transition period. They are facing the challenges of rural reconstruction and rural revitalization. In the future, village and town planning and the design of new settlements need to comprehensively consider the demands of different interest groups.

Analyzing the landscape pattern of rural settlements is an important way to reveal the relationships between landscape change and human activities. Based on Landsat TM/ETM/OLI satellite remote sensing images as data sources and Hejiang River Basin as the research area, this paper expounds the information on the spatial distribution of rural settlements at four time points in 1990, 2000, 2010 and 2020. Using the methods of landscape pattern analysis, GIS spatial analysis and spatial statistics, this paper analyzes the spatial characteristics of the rural settlements, such as scale, distribution and shape, and then discusses the influences of terrain, rivers, location and policy factors on the spatial characteristics of the rural settlements. The results show that with the advance of time, the number of rural settlement patches in Hejiang River Basin is decreasing, the patch area and average patch area are increasing, the patch density is decreasing, and the settlement pattern tends toward cluster development. In addition, the shapes of settlement patches tend to be complicated and irregular, so it is necessary to strengthen planning and guidance in order to promote the regular layout of the settlements. The overall distribution of settlements is dense in the Northwest and Southeast, but sparse in the Middle and West, with a high density in the plains and a low density in hills and mountains. This study found that the terrain, river and location factors have significant influences on the spatial pattern of settlements.