The Impact of Agricultural Socialized Services to Promote the Farmland Scale Management Behavior of Smallholder Farmers: Empirical Evidence from the Rice-Growing Region of Southern China

Baozhong Cai, Fang Shi, Yuangji Huang and Meseret Abatechanie
Additional contact information
Baozhong Cai: Research Institute of Rural Revitalization, Hunan University of Science and Engineering, Yongzhou 425199, China
Fang Shi: School of Economics, Hunan Agricultural University, Changsha 410128, China
Yuangji Huang: Research Institute of Rural Revitalization, Hunan University of Science and Engineering, Yongzhou 425199, China
Meseret Abatechanie: Research Institute of Rural Revitalization, Hunan University of Science and Engineering, Yongzhou 425199, China

Sustainability, 2021, vol. 14, issue 1, 1-17

Abstract: Farmland scale management (FSM) is an essential strategy to establish an appropriate management scale for agricultural production, enhance smallholder farmer production efficiency, and improve the utilization rate of farmland. The Chinese government promotes farmland transfer as a tool to establish modern and moderate-scale agriculture. However, farmers remain unable to afford agricultural services and inputs required for appropriate FSM after farmland is transferred-in. This paper aims to examine the impact of agricultural socialized services (ASSs) on the FSM behavior of smallholder farmers through farmland transfer. A theoretical framework for the farmer household production aspect of this relationship is developed. A weighted least squares (WLS) model is applied to empirically examine smallholder farmers’ decisions to expand the scale of farmland induced by the promotion of ASSs based on data collected from 741 households in 2020 in the rice-growing region of southern China. The findings reveal that ASSs have a positive and significant impact on small farmers’ FSM. Small farmers’ behavior regarding farmland transfer is affected positively by the promotion of ASSs. The increase of ASSs encourages small farmers to transfer-in more farmland. However, the impact of ASSs on various steps of agricultural practice varied according to the FSM of smallholder farmers. Our findings imply that the government should take the development of ASSs as one of the main methods for promoting the establishment of moderate and large-scale agriculture and rural revitalization. Strengthening policies and financial support for both private and public ASS providers through financial innovation subsidies and preferential tax policies will help smallholder farmers reduce input costs and increase the scale of production and profits. The findings of this paper will provide a scientific basis and reference for the development of moderate-scale agriculture and rural revitalization.

Keywords: agricultural socialized services; productivity; farmland scale management; smallholder farmers; moderate-scale agriculture (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/1/316/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/1/316/ (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:gam:jsusta:v:14:y:2021:i:1:p:316-:d:713242

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().