Review of methodology and application of agricultural eco-efficiency

Agricultural ecological efficiency analysis is vital in evaluating sustainable development of agriculture. It can be used to accurately assess the real value of agricultural ecosystem for the realization of efficient use of agricultural resources and for the alleviation of endogenous pollution caused by agricultural waste. As a result, it can also be used to solve problems concerning the degradation of agricultural ecosystems and the reduction in environmental pollution, and thereby laying a solid foundation for sustainable agricultural development. After a systematic review of the existing literatures on agricultural ecological efficiency, it was found that the three prominent problems which needed thorough research were:1) the precise definition of agricultural ecological efficiency and consistent evaluation method of agricultural ecological efficiency. 2) A thorough research on the macro-factors with significant impact on agricultural ecological efficiency and detailed analysis of agricultural ecological efficiency at national scale. 3) Extensive researches on important issues such as ecological capital, ecological agriculture and ecological agriculture policy. Thus in order to promote sustainable development of agriculture in China, the following aspects were needed in future research:1) improvement of the method of evaluation of agricultural ecological efficiency, 2) augmenting factors in the research of agricultural ecological efficiency, and 3) promotion of the application of agricultural ecological efficiency in areas such as ecological capital production, ecological agriculture production and ecological agriculture policy.