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Pesticide overuse has caused a series of negative impacts on environment and human health. The purpose of this paper is to examine the farmers’ behavior of pesticide overuse and to identify the underlying determinants, based on the survey data from Shandong Province, China.

A two-stage semiparametric approach and the binary probit model were employed in this study to analyze the marginal pesticide productivity and investigate the determinants of the pesticide overuse.

Results suggest that the marginal pesticide productivity is negative, indicating a serious overuse of pesticides in the surveyed area. Both market factors and government regulation have impacts on farmers’ use of pesticides.

This study estimates marginal pesticide productivity with an innovative methodology, and explores the role of market factors and government regulation in regulating farmers’ behavior of pesticide use, especially in a typical vegetable growing area and targeting a specific type of vegetable.

The negative externalities of pesticide overuse increasingly concern the public. However, little empirical evidence has been provided for pesticide overuse and the relationship between the governmental agricultural extension system reforms and pesticide use in grain production from a nationwide perspective. The purpose of this paper is to estimate the productive effect and overuse of pesticides, and it also investigates the effect of the governmental agricultural extension system reforms on pesticide expenditure in rice, maize and wheat production in China.

A two-equation system model consisting of an exponential-specific damage-control production function and a pesticide use function is applied to the provincial-level data during the period 1985–2016.

While pesticide expenditure significantly increases grain productivity, the actual pesticide expenditure exceeds the economically optimal level. The commercialization reform of the governmental agricultural extension system contributed to the increase in pesticide expenditure. Moreover, the de-commercialization reform of the governmental agricultural extension system plays a limited role in pesticide reduction. Price fluctuations for grain and pesticide also impose significant effects on pesticide expenditure.

This study has two important policy implications for pesticide reduction in China. It is urgent to specify the functions of the governmental agricultural extension system, and encourage the development of the socialized agricultural technology service. More efforts should also be made to remove the bureaucratic intervention on the pricing mechanism of grain product and pesticide.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the factors believed to influence the behavior of 1,042 rice farmers in Malaysia regarding the overuse of pesticides. Frequent overuse of pesticide will have an impact on human health and the environment, which lead to greater expenditure on health care.

The theoretical models of compliance behavior tested include the basic deterrence model, which focuses on the enforcement of regulation as a key determinant of compliance. The models integrate economic theory with theories of social behavior to account for motivations expected, influencing individuals’ decisions on whether to follow the regulation on using pesticides.

Significance tests reported that the information regarding the danger of using pesticides, the perception toward the impact on the environment and the expected impact on health influences the compliance behavior of using pesticides.

These findings highlight the necessity for the policy makers to design an effective program which gives more information and provide training related to the risk and the safe handling of pesticides.

The farmers who receive information and training related to handling of pesticides become more cautious in the use of pesticides. Countries involved in agriculture and the use of pesticides widely by their farmers need to emphasize continuous training and periodic information dissemination.

The implication drawn is rice farmers should be encouraged to practice new methods in rice planting, especially in the integrated pest management method.

These research findings suggest that the overuse of pesticides in the rice farming continues to be an important problem.

This study aims to examine the attitudinal inconsistency among Taiwanese consumers toward organic agriculture/food, and its relationship to their willingness to pay a premium and purchase for organic product.

A telephone survey consisting of 913 households was made to reach an estimated 3.3 percent sampling error with 95 percent confidence level.

It was found that those who were female, who had higher occupation prestige, who had college education levels, who were aged in their 40s, and who possessed an optimistic opinion toward the necessity of organic farming tend to pay a premium for and buy organic food. The majority of Taiwanese respondents showed a high level of concern about pesticides but a low trust in organic food, which revealed an attitudinal inconsistency toward organic agriculture/food. A multiple discriminant analysis with a moderating variable shows that consumers' trust in organic food and their pesticide concern jointly explain the respondents' willingness to pay a premium and purchasing behavior. The influence of consumers' pesticide concern on their willingness to pay a premium and purchase actually depends on their levels of trust.

As a whole, lack of trust and confusing organic product certification levels is the main barrier to Taiwan's organic agriculture development. Further communication and policy modification is needed to reinforce consumers' confidence in organic agriculture/food.

China is the world's largest consumer of pesticides. To increase the use efficiency and achieve more sustainable and environmentally friendly use of pesticides in China, it is crucial to understand why Chinese farmers use such a large amount of pesticides.

The relationship between farm size and pesticide use was investigated by using national household-level panel data from 1995 to 2016.

Farms that are small and fragmented lead to the use of large amounts of pesticides in China. For a given crop type, three factors contribute to a negative relationship between farm size and pesticide use: the spillover effect from the use of pesticides by other farmers in the same village, the level of mechanization and the management ability of farmers. The first two factors play important roles in the cultivation of grain crops, while the last factor is the main reason why farmers with larger plots of land use fewer pesticides in the cultivation of vegetables. In addition, the effect of agricultural machinery services on reducing the use of pesticides is currently limited, and the service system in China is still insufficient, which has been pointed out that it is also due to the prevalence of small and fragmented farms.

The authors investigate and compare the farm size–pesticide use relationship in both grain and cash crop production. Moreover, the authors systematically explore and explain how farm size is related to a reduction in pesticide use in the cultivation of grain crops and cash crops. These results can help to better understand the role of land scale in pesticide use, lay a foundation for the formulation of policies to reduce pesticide use and provide valuable knowledge about pesticide use for other developing countries around the world.

The purpose of this study is to evaluate food supply chain stakeholders’ intention to use Industry 5.0 (I5.0) drones for cleaner production in food supply chains.

The authors used a quantitative research design and collected data using an online survey administered to a sample of 264 food supply chain stakeholders in Nigeria. The partial least square structural equation model was conducted to assess the research’s hypothesised relationships.

The authors provide empirical evidence to support the contributions of I5.0 drones for cleaner production. The findings showed that food supply chain stakeholders are more concerned with the use of I5.0 drones in specific operations, such as reducing plant diseases, which invariably enhances cleaner production. However, there is less inclination to drone adoption if the aim was pollution reduction, predicting seasonal output and addressing workers’ health and safety challenges. The findings outline the need for awareness to promote the use of drones for addressing workers’ hazard challenges and knowledge transfer on the potentials of I5.0 in emerging economies.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to address I5.0 drones’ adoption using a sustainability model. The authors contribute to existing literature by extending the sustainability model to identify the contributions of drone use in promoting cleaner production through addressing specific system operations. This study addresses the gap by augmenting a sustainability model, suggesting that technology adoption for sustainability is motivated by curbing challenges categorised as drivers and mediators.

Mental budgeting, as a part of mental accounting theory, is expected to impact a household's budgetary management in terms of expenses. The purpose of this paper is to study whether and how mental budgeting can explain differences in farmers' reactions to different incentives of low-toxicity pesticide use.

Based on data from a survey of 393 vegetable farmers in the Sichuan Province, this analysis, using a Likert Scale approach, first explores whether farmers utilize mental budgeting. Secondly, using a Probit model, this paper analyzes how mental budgeting affects farmers' intentions to switch to low-toxicity pesticide use when faced with different incentives.

The results show that the majority of farmers categorize agricultural inputs into different groups and that 26.46% of the investigated farmers utilize mental budgeting for pest control practices. In addition, farmers who utilizing mental budgeting report a higher willingness to switch to low-toxicity pesticides when they're presented with a specific subsidy. Furthermore, if offered a price premium for quality, the willingness to switch to low-toxicity pesticides for farmers utilizing mentally budget is lower compared to other farmers.

This paper examines the existence of mental budgeting among farmers. It provides a better understanding of how farmers categorize agricultural inputs and their mental mechanisms with respect to agricultural expenses. Finally, this paper is the first to study the effects of mental budgeting on farmers' reactions to different incentives aimed at stimulating the adoption of low-toxicity pesticides.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the determinants and impacts of outsourcing pest and disease management on rice production in China.

A multinomial endogenous treatment effects model which accounts for selection bias was used.

The results show that outsourcing decisions are driven mainly by the size of the farm, the age of the household head and other household characteristics. Further, the authors find that outsourcing labor for pest and disease control has no significant effect on pest control cost and rice yields, though it reduces the number of pesticide applications. Conversely, outsourcing of professional services can increase rice yields by 4.1 percent, and at the same time it increases pest and disease control costs by 50.6 percent. However, it is found that outsourcing of professional services exerts no significant impact on the farm profitability.

This study suggests that households with large farm size are more likely to outsource professional services and, therefore, service providers and governments should target those farmers to provide incentives and create greater awareness of the benefits from the outsourcing of professional services. Moreover, the increase in yields along with the government subsidy justifies the outsourcing of professional services by farmers. However, service providers and policy makers have a lot of leeway to come up with cheaper methods for pest and disease management in rice production.

This study is the first attempt to simultaneously evaluate the determinants and impacts of outsourcing pest and disease management on rice production in China.

Pesticide residue is a stubborn problem affecting the quality and safety of agricultural products in China, and has not yet been fundamentally resolved. The purpose of this paper is to study farmers' perception of pesticide residues, as well as the main factors affecting their perception from the viewpoint of farmers. Additionally, this research attempts to explore the basic characteristics of pesticide residues arising in the process of producing agricultural products under the prevailing policy background, so as to provide decision‐making references for the Chinese government to deepen the security management system of agricultural products.

The structural equation model (SEM) is an analytical tool for the observation and treatment of latent variables that are difficult to observe directly, and for the consideration of inevitable errors. This paper investigates the main factors affecting farmers' perception of pesticide residues in the investigated regions based on the SEM and samples of 241 farmers in six counties (cities and regions) of three districts in the Jiangsu Province of China.

According to the research, regional difference, farmers' gender, age, years of education, pesticide training and their own demand for safe agricultural products had different influences on their perception of pesticide residues. Additionally, it was difficult to measure the influence of family characteristics on farmers' perception of pesticide residues. Although the present paper only shows a preliminary study, its conclusion provides a reference value for the Chinese government to deepen the reform of the quality and safety regulatory system of agricultural products.

There are many similar studies in overseas countries, but the application of SEM in the study of the main factors affecting farmers' perception of pesticide residues has not been completely reported previously in domestic literatures. The research assumption of this paper has practically verified that corresponding research conclusions of foreign scholars in this field have universality in China.

The purpose of this paper is to study the impact of government supervision and market environment on farmers' pesticide application behavior, as well as the intermediary effect of farmers' literacy, and investigate the substitution effect between government supervision and market environment.

In this paper, logit and Poisson regression models were used to investigate the comprehensive impact of government supervision and market environment on farmers' pesticide application behavior, and the intermediary effect model is used to examine the intermediary effect of farmers' literacy.

Government supervision is an important constraint for the formation of individual behavior paradigm, but it has both positive and negative effects, depending on different instruments. The market subject constraint and market incentive are two important ways that the market environment affects Chinese farmers' pesticide application behavior. Farmers' literacy plays a partial mediating role in the influencing mechanism of government and market factors. The government supervision and market environment, two different constraint forces, have substitution effects in the process of regulating farmers' pesticide application behavior.

In the influence mechanism, farmers' literacy, such as values, responsibilities and skill requirement related to scientific pesticide use, was included into the analysis framework as intermediary variables. The authors found that government supervision and market environment not only directly affect farmers' pesticide application behavior but also indirectly affect farmers' pesticide application behavior through farmers' literacy.