Abstract:Improving rural infrastructure construction is an effective path to promote and to achieve the modernization of agriculture and rural areas. Taking Hunan Province as an example and using a panel data from 2011 to 2020, this paper analyzed the level of the modernization of agriculture and rural areas and explored the effects of rural infrastructure on the level of the modernization of agriculture and rural areas by the Tobit model. Results show that the overall level of the modernization of agriculture and rural areas in Hunan Province has improved from 2011 to 2020, with a spatial distribution pattern of “Changsha-Zhuzhou-Xiangtan city cluster > Dongting Lake> Southern Hunan > Great Xiangxi region”. However, rural infrastructure can effectively contribute to the improvement of the modernization of agriculture and rural areas, but the impacts of different types of rural infrastructures are different, among which water and electricity infrastructures have positive effects and transportation infrastructures have negative effects. Meanwhile, the impacts of rural infrastructure on the level of the modernization of agriculture and rural areas have regional heterogeneity, among which the positive relationship of rural infrastructure on the modernization of agriculture and rural areas is most prominent in the Dongting Lake, and the positive impact is relatively weak in the remaining areas. Therefore, to accelerate the modernization of agriculture and rural areas, this paper suggests guaranteeing the high-quality input system of rural infrastructure, improving the high-quality construction system of rural infrastructure, and establishing the high-quality management and maintenance system of rural infrastructure.