Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics最新文献

Agricultural cooperatives in Vietnam help smallholders improve economic benefits and support farmers adapt to external shocks. Various policies have been implemented in Vietnam to develop agricultural cooperatives. The climate-smart agriculture (CSA) approach is integral to the promotion of sustainable agriculture. However, whether cooperatives facilitate households' adoption of CSA technologies remains unclear. This study examines how paddy farms' participation in cooperatives affects their CSA adoption. We use propensity score matching (PSM) to assess the influence of cooperatives on the adoption of climate-smart agriculture. The study's key results suggest that participation in CSA training and location in coastal provinces positively influence engagement in cooperatives. In contrast, cooperative membership is negatively affected by farming plots and farmer association membership. PSM indicates that the role of cooperatives in advancing CSA adoption becomes significant when the intensity of technical support increases from 1.4 to 2.1 cropping seasons. Cooperative membership has heterogeneous effects across farm and household attributes. The effects are greater on farms with a production scale of < 2 ha, literate household heads and those that do not engage in off-farm activities. To enhance how cooperatives support farmers adopting CSA, they should focus on training classes and facilitate farmland accumulation.

JEL Classifications: Q13, Q54

The expansion of the digital economy, particularly e-commerce, has become a key driver of China's pursuit of high-quality economic growth. This study examines the impact of the National Rural E-commerce Comprehensive Demonstration Policy (NRECDP) on rural labour force participation in e-commerce. Using a staggered difference-in-differences design and panel data from the National Fixed-site Rural Survey (NFRS), we evaluate how the policy has shaped e-commerce engagement in rural areas. The result shows that NRECDP significantly increased the share of the rural labour force involved in e-commerce, raising village-level participation rates by 0.30% during the pilot period. The effect was stronger in villages with lower human capital and those located near urban areas, indicating marked regional heterogeneity. Mechanism analysis suggests that the policy promoted rural e-commerce mainly by lowering transaction costs, improving digital payment capacity and strengthening the local e-commerce environment. These findings highlight the importance of maintaining targeted support policies to sustain rural e-commerce development.

This study estimates the impact of access to credit on mechanisation service expenditure by considering farmers' binary credit access decisions and distinguishing between formal and informal credit access. We employ a conditional mixed process model to address selection bias issues and use open-access data from the Rural Development Institute at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (Beijing, China) through the 2020 China Rural Revitalization Survey. The theoretical analyses suggest that relaxing credit constraints enables farmers to achieve higher net returns by increasing all variable inputs, including farm machines, until they achieve the expected optimal level. The empirical results reveal that access to credit significantly increases mechanisation service expenditure by 115.5 yuan/mu, and the impact is larger on farmers cultivating small- and medium-sized farms and those residing in the less developed central and western regions. Access to formal and informal credit affects mechanisation service expenditure differently. Specifically, accessing credit from formal sources (e.g., banks) significantly increases mechanisation service expenditure by 44.7 yuan/mu, while accessing credit from informal sources (e.g., friends and relatives) has no statistically significant effect on mechanisation service expenditure. Moreover, credit primarily intended for financing agricultural production significantly increases mechanisation service expenditure by 83.5 yuan/mu, whereas credit used mainly for non-agricultural purposes significantly reduces such expenditure by 25.5 yuan/mu. These findings are further verified by estimating the effects of loan amounts on mechanisation service expenditure. Finally, we also investigate the nexus between mechanisation service adoption and farm performance, revealing that mechanisation service adoption increases crop yield by 12.6% and commercialisation by 77.4%, respectively.

Calorie information is often absent for delivered meals. We use a discrete choice experiment to examine how three calorie label strategies affect consumer choices for delivered meals: a numeric calorie label, a numeric plus traffic light calorie label and a physical activity calorie equivalent label. Relative to no label, all three strategies increase preferences for low-calorie delivered meals. Consumers prefer medium-calorie delivered meals more under the numeric and the numeric plus traffic light labels than under the physical activity calorie equivalent label. Conversely, the physical activity calorie equivalent label outperforms the numeric label in enhancing the market share of low-calorie delivered meals. The numeric plus traffic light label is more effective than the numeric label in reducing the market share of high-calorie delivered meals while increasing consumer willingness to pay for low-calorie delivered meals. Furthermore, effects vary across meal categories and product characteristics. These findings underscore that flexible calorie labelling on delivery platforms can promote healthier choices and provide actionable guidance for industry stakeholders and policymakers.

Calorie information is often absent for delivered meals. We use a discrete choice experiment to examine how three calorie label strategies affect consumer choices for delivered meals: a numeric calorie label, a numeric plus traffic light calorie label and a physical activity calorie equivalent label. Relative to no label, all three strategies increase preferences for low-calorie delivered meals. Consumers prefer medium-calorie delivered meals more under the numeric and the numeric plus traffic light labels than under the physical activity calorie equivalent label. Conversely, the physical activity calorie equivalent label outperforms the numeric label in enhancing the market share of low-calorie delivered meals. The numeric plus traffic light label is more effective than the numeric label in reducing the market share of high-calorie delivered meals while increasing consumer willingness to pay for low-calorie delivered meals. Furthermore, effects vary across meal categories and product characteristics. These findings underscore that flexible calorie labelling on delivery platforms can promote healthier choices and provide actionable guidance for industry stakeholders and policymakers.