Digital embedding,grassland ecological perception and livelihood strategy options for pastoralists
Digital countryside is a strategic direction for rural revitalization,and digital information technology is gradually becoming an important channel to improve ecological awareness,awaken and promote the transformation of herders'livelihood strategies.In this paper,based on 383 field research data from pastoral areas in the northern Xinjiang grasslands,the Mlogit model was used to analyze the impact of ICT embedding intensity on herders'livelihood strategies and to explore the mediating effect of grassland ecological cognition,and the results remain significant after overcoming the endogeneity problem.The study showed that the livelihood choice of pastoralists in northern Xinjiang was dominated by part-time livestock husbandry,accounting for 52.5%,while the lowest percentage was for out-of-home employment.The relationship between ICT embedding intensity and pastoralists'livelihood strategies showed an"inverted U-shaped"non-linear relationship.In other words,the deeper the ICT embedding intensity is,the greater the probability of herders to choose the livestock and tourism livelihood strategy,and the greater the probability of herders to choose the livestock and tourism livelihood strategy,but when the embedding intensity reaches the relative threshold,it is not conducive to herders'livelihood transition.ICT embedding can significantly improve herders'ecological cognition,and ecological cognition plays a part in mediating the effect between ICT embedding and herders'livelihood transformation,herders can effectively improve their ecological cognition and promote livelihood diversification by using both online learning and online social communication.Heterogeneity analysis showed that the optimal range of Internet access for herders should be limited to 3-6 hours per day,which could positively influence herders'livelihood transformation,at the same time,within a reasonable range,the deeper the ICT embedding,the more it can promote the livelihood transformation of herders in the middle and lower age groups.
digital embeddinggrassland ecological perceptionlivelihood strategieslivelihood transformation