Do Chinese Farmers Misuse Pesticide Intentionally or Not?

Li Zhao, Changwei Wang, Haiying Gu, Chengyan Yue

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

1 Scopus citations

Abstract

Nonstandard pesticide-application behavior leads to excessive pesticide residue and even affects the quality and safety of agricultural products and agricultural sustainability. Based on 968 valid samples randomly selected in Jiangsu Province of China, it focuses on the impact of incident shock and yield fluctuation avoidance on the pesticide-application behavior of farmers. Then, it investigated the impact of intentional factors, such as insufficient cognition and lack of knowledge, on their improper pesticide-application behavior. This study shows that, besides the pursuit of improper income, inadequate awareness and preventive actions to avoid operational risks are also important factors in farmers’ nonstandard pesticide application. In addition, the study also shows that farmers who understand the responsibility unit of agricultural product quality and safety supervision are more inclined to choose standardized application of pesticides. The higher the education level of farmers, the higher the probability of standardized application of pesticides. Therefore, farmers’ nonstandard pesticide-application behavior is largely due to the farmers’ insufficient awareness of the harm of pesticide residues or the lack of trust in the efficacy of pesticides. Moreover, the study also shows that adverse selection phenomenon exists in pesticide-application training.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Article number1749
JournalAgriculture (Switzerland)
Volume13
Issue number9
DOIs
StatePublished - Sep 2023

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 by the authors.

Keywords

  • incidents shock
  • pesticide application
  • quality and safety
  • risk aversion

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