Does Smart Agricultural Technology Improve Rice Production Performance? Evidence from Rural China

Liang Fu and Gucheng Li

No 404714, 2026 Annual Meeting, July 26 - 28, 2026, Kansas City, Missouri from Agricultural and Applied Economics Association

Abstract: Growing attention has been paid to how agricultural technology adoption affects crop production. However, little is known about the effects of smart agricultural technology on agricultural production performance. This study uses survey data from 1,146 rice farmers to examine the effects of smart agricultural technology (SAT) adoption on rice yield, technical efficiency, net returns and production costs. To reduce selection bias caused by farmers’ selfselection into SAT adoption, this study applies a doubly robust inverse probability weighted regression adjustment estimator. The results show that SAT adoption significantly increases rice yield, technical efficiency and net returns by 10.63%, 10.26% and 27.69%, respectively. It also reduces production costs by 3.83%. Further analysis shows that SAT adoption significantly reduces fertilizer, pesticide, labor and other inputs. These results are broadly consistent with estimates from propensity score matching and endogenous switching regression models. The findings suggest that promoting SAT adoption among smallholder rice farmers can help increase yield and net returns, improve efficiency, reduce input use and support agricultural green transformation.

Keywords: Productivity Analysis; Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 35
Date: 2026
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ags:aaea26:404714

DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.404714

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