Telecoupling Perspective on the Evolution and Driving Factors of Virtual Cropland Networks in Global Wheat Trade

The international wheat trade serves as a vital pathway for balancing the global food supply and demand while facilitating the cross-regional allocation of cropland resources. Based on the telecoupling framework, this study constructed a global virtual-cropland-flow network using wheat trade data from eight time points between 1995 and 2023. Social network analysis and quadratic assignment procedure regression were applied to examine its structural evolution and driving factors. The findings reveal that (1) while growing in connectivity, the virtual cropland network exhibits structural vulnerability and evolutionary complexity. (2) The network demonstrated a clear telecoupled structure, with the sending system shifting from U.S.–Canada dominance towards multipolarity, and the receiving system centered in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, with China at its core. The United States and France are major spillover systems. (3) Economic development and foreign demand significantly promote the establishment and intensification of trade relationships between countries. Geographical distance has a dual effect: it strongly negatively influences trade initiation but can be overcome by high complementarity between countries during trade deepening. (4) International wheat trade contributes to global cropland savings but also introduces systemic risks and environmental spillovers in some countries. The results provide theoretical support for building sustainable food trade and agricultural resource governance systems and offer important insights for advancing SDG 2 (Zero Hunger), SDG 12 (Responsible Consumption and Production), sustainable land systems, and the optimization of global land governance.