Abstract: The non-market transfer of farmland is not only unfavorable to ease the degree of fragmentation of farmland, but also hinders large-scale operation, and even reduces agricultural production efficiency. In practice, China's farmland transfer market is undergoing a positive transformation from an informal “acquaintance market” to a formal trading market. The existing literature focuses on the impact of the farmland institution on this phenomenon, but few studies have paid attention to the role of digital finance.    In order to make up for this gap, this paper studies the impact of digital finance on the marketization transformation of farmland transfer and its influence mechanism of. The theoretical analysis shows that the positive role of digital finance in promoting the inter-industry and inter-regional flow of rural labor and capital will break the closure and the “differential pattern” of the rural society, thereby inducing the order of “relational” farmland transfer market maintained by acquaintance networks to “contractual”. Furthermore, using the national micro survey data, this paper tests this theoretical hypothesis through probit, heckprobit and extended regression models. The results show that the use of digital finance has significantly broadened the transaction radius of farmland and encouraged farmers to transfer farmland to non-acquaintances for profit. After alleviating the endogenous problems of sample selection bias, reverse causality and missing variables, and conducting robustness by constructing panel data and replacing core explanatory variables, the study finds the above conclusion is still valid. Mechanism analysis shows that digital finance not only improves the availability of financial services such as credit and insurance for farmers while encouraging the transfer-in party to carry out production with market logic, but also provides guarantee for the transfer-out party, thus releasing the potential of both supply and demand parties and enhancing the willingness of both parties to allocate farmland resources in a market-oriented way to maximize returns. Furthermore, digital finance broadens the channels for farmers to obtain agricultural land transfer information, reduces transaction costs by alleviating information friction in the field of farmland transfer objects and plots, and promotes farmers to rationally allocate farmland resources in a larger scope. In addition, the use of digital finance can increase the rent of farmland and reduce the probability of transferring farmland without rent, which further confirms its role in the marketization transformation of farmland transfer.    From a new perspective of technological progress, this paper provides theoretical explanation and empirical evidence for the market-oriented transformation of farmland transfer in China. This paper also supplements the relevant literature on the economic effects of China's digital financial development, and reveals the role of digital finance in shaping farmers' market behavior, alleviating information friction and promoting the market-oriented transformation of the rural society. Based on this, the article proposes to continue to improve the penetration rate of digital finance in rural areas. In the short term, websites or services related to farmland transfer can be embedded in digital financial applications such as WeChat and Alipay, which are now widely used in our daily life, so as to give full play to the positive role of digital finance in the market-oriented transformation of farmland transfer. In the long run, the government should focus on solving the problem of information friction in farmland transfer, build an information sharing platform, optimize the market environment of farmland transfer, and promote the modernization and the large-scale operation of agriculture.

Key words: Digital Finance, Farmland Transfer, Market-oriented Transformation, Transaction Radius

摘要： 中国的农地流转市场正在经历由非正式“熟人市场”向正式交易市场的转型。已有文献聚焦于农地制度对此现象的影响,但鲜有研究注意到数字金融所发挥的作用。本文理论探讨数字金融对农地流转市场化转型的影响与作用机制,并基于全国性的微观调查数据进行实证检验。研究发现,数字金融使用显著拓宽了农户农地流转的交易半径,激励农户出于营利性动机向非熟人流转农地。机制分析表明,数字金融通过提高农户金融服务可得性及缓解农地流转对象和地块领域的信息摩擦,推动农户在更大的市场范围内合理配置农地资源。此外,数字金融使用能够提高农户流转农地的租金水平,降低“零租金”流转农地的概率,进一步印证了其对农地流转市场化转型的作用。

关键词: 数字金融, 农地流转, 市场化转型, 交易半径