Can rural human capital inputs enhance agricultural total factor productivity? - Based on the dualistic economic structure perspective

Can Wang
Additional contact information
Can Wang: School of Economics and Management, Northwestern University, Xi 'an, China

Review of Economic Assessment, 2023, vol. 2, issue 3, 88-102

Abstract: Human factor inputs are key to promoting agricultural modernisation. Traditional economic theory suggests that improving human capital is the key to boosting agricultural productivity, but can this conclusion hold in China's dualistic economic structure? We use Chinese provincial panel data from 2000-2017 to examine the impact of rural human capital inputs on agricultural total factor productivity. We find that, on the whole, rural human capital inputs have a negative effect on agricultural total factor productivity, and that there is a "rural human capital trap". Mechanism analysis reveals that rural human capital inputs, on the one hand, cause labour loss and reduce the quality of agricultural workers, while on the other hand, they may promote the application of mechanization, which has both positive and negative effects on agricultural total factor productivity. Heterogeneity analysis finds that this negative effect is more pronounced in the central region of China because of the serious loss of rural labour. This study provides new policy insights for further improving the structure of rural education inputs and promoting human capital accumulation in agriculture.

Keywords: Human capital inputs; labour quality; total factor productivity in agriculture; dual economy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.anserpress.org/journal/rea/2/3/20/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.anserpress.org/journal/rea/2/3/20 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bba:j00010:v:2:y:2023:i:3:p:88-102:d:259

Access Statistics for this article

Review of Economic Assessment is currently edited by Ramona Wang

More articles in Review of Economic Assessment from Anser Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Ramona Wang ().