The evolutionary trajectory of the rural settlements in Southern Jiangsu in the past 20 years: From the perspective of urbanization and land use

For a long time, due to lack of accurate data covering large areas, it is difficult to capture the continuous spatial evolutionary trajectory of rural settlements shaped by rapid urbanization and rural land use policies. To fill this gap, based on theoretical analysis this paper systemically detected the changing characteristics of scale, spatial morphology, distribution, and land use pattern of rural settlements in Southern Jiangsu in the past 20 years depending on the data of land resource survey in 2009 and 2019. The study suggests that the total area and per capita size of rural settlements declined by 30% and 2% respectively as a result of rural land consolidation and the influx of enormous immigrants from underdeveloped regions. The spatial density and average shape index dropped by 14% and 44% respectively in the recent decade, indicating an evident trend of decentralization in spatial distribution, and regularization in the spatial morphology. Furthermore, residential land within rural settlements decreased by 33% over the past decade while the land for industry and commercial service steadily increased, demonstrating that the function for manufacturing and diversified services had been strengthened. Considering the emerging issue of the aging population and new business opportunities in rural Southern Jiangsu, rural settlements regeneration might be the focus of future research.