Decoupling Analysis between Rural Population Change and Rural Construction Land Changes in China

Developing countries account for about 86.5% of the world’s population and are experiencing rapid urbanization. Globally, the increase in the urban population is generally accompanied by the expansion of the latter and construction lands, as well as the reduction in the rural population and rural construction lands. However, with the rapid development of urbanization in China, the rural population has decreased, while the proportion of rural construction lands has increased, resulting in a significant waste of land resources. In order to quantitatively characterize the degree of deviation between the permanent rural population and rural construction lands based on the 2009–2016 demographic data and land survey data in China, we comprehensively used the decoupling model and the coordination degree model to analyze the temporal change characteristics, spatial distribution law, and the degree of deviation of rural construction land areas and the number of rural permanent residents. Firstly, according to the decoupling model, the type of decoupling between the area of rural construction lands and the number of rural permanent residents at the national scale was strongly negative. Secondly, according to the coordination degree model, the coordination type between rural construction land areas and the rural resident population was uncoordinated; at the provincial scale, the coordination system involved one city and one district (Beijing and the Tibet Autonomous Region) and the basic coordination of two cities (Tianjin and Shanghai). Xinjiang and Qinghai belonged to the reconcilable type, and the other 25 provinces belonged to the uncoordinated type. Finally, according to the comprehensive measurement model, the number of rural permanent residents and rural construction lands showed two types of decoupling: highly strong negative decoupling incoordination and moderately and weakly strong negative decoupling incoordination.