The Path Analysis and Its Application Study on Cultivated Land Change in Hubei Province

On the basis of introducing the principle of path analy- sis, this paper positively analyzes the influence factors of culti- vated land change from 1978 to 2002 in Hubei Province. The relationship between the influence factors and cultivated land change is studied by means of the path analysis. The results show that the construction rearrangement of agriculture, grain security and market mechanism are the main factors that decide the culti- vated land change. Meanwhile, the impact of investment, urbani- zation and benefit gap among the different utilizing ways also leads to the change of cultivated land. The result means that though some factors have less direct influence on the change of cultivated land, their indirect influence is significant or vice versa.