Objective It is an important way to realize sustainable development of cultivated land and ensure food security to systematically diagnose farmland toughness, identify obstacle factors of farmland toughness and promote differentiated protection of cultivated land. Taking Xian’ an District of Hubei Province as an empirical object, this study systematically diagnosed and analyzed land use in the study area and the obstacle factors in each regulation zone, in order to provide reference for regional cultivated land utilization practice.

Methods A theoretical framework was constructed to evaluate the cultivated land utilization toughness from the three dimensions of resistance, adaptability and resilience based on the connotation of toughness. With the help of analytic hierarchy Process (AHP) and CRITIC methods, the comprehensive weight of indicators was defined. Based on the improved grey target model, the toughness of cultivated land utilization in the study area was measured, and the problems existed in the toughness of regional cultivated land utilization were measured with the diagnosis of obstacle factors.

Result ① The cultivated land utilization toughness in Xian’ an District was at an upper medium level, and the bullseye value ranged from 0.34 to 0.98, showing a spatial distribution pattern of "high in northeast and low in southwest", wherein the level of resilience was evenly distributed in alternate phases. Moreover, the resistance and adaptability were showed the trends of "high in the middle, low in the surrounding area" and "high in north and low in south". ② In the order of obstacle factors of cultivated land toughness in each zone, resilience was an important dimension affecting the toughness of cultivated land, in which the degree of farmland afforestation and distance from the central town were the main obstacle factors. The size of the field, the thickness and the distance from the traffic trunk were also the key factors restricting the toughness of cultivated land.

Conclusion Selecting seven primary indicators and sixteen secondary indicators from the dimensions of resistance, adaptability and resilience could effectively characterize the toughness level of farmland utilization. Regional cultivated land utilization should pay attention to the protection of cultivated land from the dimension of resilience, strengthening the conclusion of regional agroforestry network, coordinating the relationship between urbanization, transportation construction and cultivated land utilization, and pursuing the coordinated development of ecology and cultivated land utilization.