Recently, the results of the 10th Ministry of Education Award for Outstanding Research Achievements in Humanities and Social Sciences were officially announced. Following expert review, public notice and deliberation by the Award Committee, a total of 1499 achievements received awards in this round, including 1192 Book- and- Paper Awards (97 first prizes, 520 second prizes and 575 third prizes). The co-authored paper “Output-Oriented Agricultural Subsidy Design” by Professor FAN Tijun and Professor WU Yifan from the School was awarded the Third Prize of the Book-and-Paper Award.

    The Ministry of Education Award for Outstanding Research Achievements in Humanities and Social Sciences is the most authoritative award for philosophy and social sciences in China. It is presented every three years to recognize the academic contributions of university researchers in philosophy and social sciences and showcase major theoretical and practical outcomes generated by university social-science scholars in support of national development priorities.

    This award demonstrates the solid academic competence and innovative capacity of the School’s scholars in exploring academic frontiers and responding to national strategic demands. Taking this achievement as an opportunity, the School will contribute further insights and expertise to foster high-quality development of philosophy and social sciences and accelerate the building of a strong education nation.

    Taking into account the high fragmentation and large efficiency gaps in agricultural production across developing countries, the paper investigates the optimization of government agricultural subsidy policy design. Constrained by limited fiscal budgets for subsidies and targeting maximum total social output, the study compares four types of government agricultural subsidy policies: planting-based subsidies, output-based subsidies, composite subsidies and selective subsidies.

    Supported by the Key Project and General Project of the National Natural Science Foundation of China, this research was jointly completed by Professor FAN Tijun and Professor WU Yifan from the School, Professor Qi Feng and Professor J. George Shanthikumar from Purdue University in the United States, and Assistant Professor LI Yuanchen from Tongji University. The paper was published online in Management Science, a top-tier journal in management science.