【Objective】 Heavy metals pollution level in farmland soil is related to quality and safety of the agricultural produce and health of the farmland ecosystems. Spatial distribution and evaluation of heavy metal pollution of the soils has become the focus of concerns all over the world, and attracted wide attentions from the governments and scientists of all the countries. In recent years, the situation of soil heavy metal pollution in farmland in China is getting so serious that it has aroused country-wide concerns. To address the problem, China has promulgated the “Law of the People's Republic of China on Soil Pollution Prevention and Control”, which is an act of long-term realistic significance to regulation, control, and reasonable evaluation of the pollution of heavy metals in soils of China. 【Methods】Jiangning District of Nanjing City, the largest agricultural produce and sideline product logistics center in East China and the second in the country, has rarely been reported about the issue before. It is, therefore, necessary to perform investigations and evaluations of any heavy metal pollution problems in this region. For this study, samples of topsoil (0~20 cm) were collected from 29 pieces of farmland scattered in the region during November and December, 2017 for analysis of soil pH, organic matter and contents of 8 heavy metals, such as arsenic (As), cadmium (Cd) and chromium (Cr), Copper (Cu), mercury (Hg), nickel (Ni), lead (Pb) and zinc (Zn), and heavy metals pollution of the soil was evaluated in line with the newly released “Standards for Soil Environmental Quality and Risk Control of Agricultural Land Soil Pollution (Trial) (GB 15618-2018)” with a view to improving and optimizing the traditional evaluation methods for pollution assessment, and developing a more scientific and reasonable region-specific evaluation method, which combines the technical characteristics and spatial analysis function of GIS, and makes use of the geostatistics method in analyzing spatial distribution characteristics of the heavy metals pollution.【Results】Results show that the soils in the study area varied in the range from acidic to neutral in soil pH, lacked organic matter, and contained 8.27, 0.17, 70.84, 24.74, 0.20, 32.07, 28.48 and 73.57 mg•kg^-1 of As, Cd, Cr, Cu, Hg, Ni, Pb and Zn, respectively, all of which except for As, were higher than their respective background values of the soil environment of the region, but still within the safe ranges specified in the current standards of the nation for agricultural environment quality. So on the whole, the region is not polluted with heavy metals.【Conclusion】In certain areas of the region, soil Cd, Cu and Hg has reached their respective alert threshold, posing pollution risks, which calls for serious attention in agricultural production. The risks are quite high in the southwest and south parts of the region, forming a band in distribution. In that band, Cd, Cr, Cu, Ni and Zn are found to have come from the same source, potentially the Lishui River running through the study area. The upper reaches of the Lishui River is the Qinhuai River flowing through the urban area of Nanjing. Further studies should be done as to specific sources of the risks. Comparison of the methods for evaluating heavy metal pollution in soil shows that the single factor index method is simple, intuitive and highly adoptable to determination of whether a single item of heavy metal in soil has surpassed the criterion in soil survey and to grading of the risk; the comprehensive index method is more scientific and reasonable for comprehensive evaluation of soil heavy metal pollution; The newly promulgated “Standards for Soil Environmental Quality and Risk Control of Agricultural Land Soil Pollution (Trial) (GB 15618-2018)” is aimed at soil pollution assessment of farmland in the light of soil pH and type of land use. The promulgation of the standard is of great significance to comprehensive risk assessment of soil heavy metal pollution of farmland soils, survey and grading of soil pollution and remediation of polluted soils.