农业产业化对农民收入和农户行为的影响--以山东省龙口市为例

农业产业化是当今中国农业发展的热点，但产业化经营究竟能在多大程度上促进“三农”问题的根本转变，目前仍很少有人进行定量研究。文章以农业产业化起步较早的山东省龙口市为案例，通过生产调查和统计资料分析，对该问题做了初步研究。结果表明：尽管龙口市的乡村工业发展迅速且占据了农村经济的绝大部分，但与农民人均纯收入增长关系最为紧密的仍然是农业产业，其次才是农村第二、第三产业，这一结果应归功于农业产业化的发展。农户在家庭劳动力分配时，年老人趋向于从事农业生产，年轻人趋向于从事非农生产，许多农户将自家的劳动力投入到非农产业，同时又雇佣外地劳力从事自家的农业生产。     

Rural development in the digital age: Does information and communication technology adoption contribute to credit access and income growth in rural China?

Information and communication technology (ICT) plays an important role in rural livelihoods and household well-being. Therefore, this study examines the impact of ICT adoption on farmers' decisions to access credit and the joint effects of ICT adoption and access to credit on household income using 2016 China Labour-force Dynamics Survey data. Both recursive bivariate probit model and a selectivity-corrected ordinary least square regression model are employed for the analysis. The results show that ICT adoption increases the probability of access to credit by 12.8% in rural China and empowers rural women and farm households in relatively less-developed regions to access credit. ICT adoption and access to credit affect household income differently. ICT adoption significantly increases household income, while access to credit significantly reduces it, primarily because farmers do not use the acquired credit to invest in income-generating farm and off-farm business activities. ICT adoption has the largest positive impact on household income at the highest 90th quantile. Our findings suggest that improving rural ICT infrastructure to enhance farmers' ICT adoption and developing ICT-based financial products to enable households to access sufficient funds can improve rural household welfare.     

Off- and on-farm labour participation in Italian farm households

Most farms are family business, both in developed and developing countries. Labour allocation choices of farm household members are therefore relevant both for production choices in the farm and for rural labour markets. In particular, off-farm work and combination of on- and off-farm work (pluriactivity) are viewed as an efficient allocation of household labour resources. Moreover, labour choice of the children of the farm household is relevant for farm succession. In this article, we extend previous literature by estimating in an unified framework labour participation choices both for on- and off-farm work for operators, spouses and their eldest children in working age, using a five equation multivariate probit.     

An introduction to rural and agricultural development in the digital age

This special issue contributes to the development economics literature by highlighting the role of information communication and technologies (ICTs) in supporting rural and agricultural development. It is comprised of nine papers. Key findings from this special issue include: (1) internet use increases rural consumption diversity and agricultural productivity; (2) smartphone use empowers rural women in household decision-making and off-farm work participation; (3) smartphone-based agricultural extension services boost rural income growth; (4) a lack of ICT infrastructure and inadequate skills to use digital technologies are two key factors that lead to digital poverty traps for smallholder rural farmers; (5) ICT adoption increases the probability of rural households' access to credit and empowers rural women and farm households in relatively less developed regions to access credit; (6) digital financial inclusion reduces farmers' vulnerability to poverty; and (7) e-commerce adoption increases both sales prices and marketing costs, but the magnitude of increasing the former is higher than the magnitude of increasing the latter, which finally contributes to a higher gross return. This special issue also proposes practical instruments and implications for advancing the application of ICTs in rural areas to accelerate rural and agricultural development in the digital age.     

Consumption,habit formation,and savings: Evidence from a rural household panel survey

Protecting consumption from the effects of uninsured risk is vital for rural farming households, who tend to be poor and live close to subsistence level. Income uncertainty and habit formation play important roles in the consumption and savings. Variability in weather conditions has a strong linkage with variability in agricultural income in developing countries. This study analyzes consumption and saving decisions of rural farm households in India. Using household panel data for 4 years, we estimated consumption equation accounting for habit formation under income uncertainty. Our findings suggest an evidence for habit formation among rural households. Additionally, we found that both annual and seasonal weather risks significantly influence savings among rural households. Findings from this study also suggest a robust and vibrant farm economy and that the nonfarm economy could contribute to the economic well‐being of rural farming households.     

农村劳动力非农就业与土地流转——基于动力视角的研究

劳动力转移理论表明,农村劳动力非农就业的动力可能是农业收入下降或非农部门工资上涨。虽然都能促进非农就业,但这两种因素对土地市场的作用机制并不相同。基于此,笔者考察了短期内农村劳动力非农就业与土地流转的关系。结果表明,劳动力非农就业与土地流转的关系因非农就业动力而异。农业收入下降推动农村劳动力非农就业,抑制农户间比较优势发挥,抑制土地流转;而非农部门工资上涨拉动农村劳动力非农就业,促进农户间比较优势发挥,促进土地流转。因此,非农就业市场与土地流转市场的关系并不等同于家庭劳动力非农就业与农户土地流转行为的关系。劳动力大量非农就业没有引发土地快速流转的原因可能是农业经营环境恶化,利润下降。     

Is life more risky in the open? Household risk-coping and the opening of China's labor markets

This paper uses a unique panel of data from rural China to analyze the impact of expanding connections to off-farm labor markets on the income and consumption of farm households. With stronger village ties to both migrant and local off-farm labor markets, households in previously autarkic village communities experience reduced exposure to shocks affecting agricultural production. The analyses presented in this paper control for the persistent effect of past shocks influencing income and consumption, household attrition potentially correlated with shocks, and endogeneity of household demographic composition, land holdings and village network connections to migrant and local labor markets.     

The Effect of Off-farm Work on the Intensity of Agricultural Production

Changes in agricultural production methods have been associated with environmental pressure and a loss of natural habitats. This paper explores the extent to which farmer participation in off-farm work (an increasing phenomenon in most developed countries) changes the intensity of agricultural input use focusing, in particular, on fertilizer and crop protection product use. A sample selection model that accounts for both unobserved heterogeneity between farms and the potential simultaneity between farm operations and hours worked off-farm is estimated for 2,419 farms in England and Wales. The econometric evidence indicates that the input intensity of products which have well-established links to environmental damage can increase as well as decrease. The results suggest that that fertilizer intensity may decline as off-farm labor increases while the use of crop protection per hectare increases as off-farm work increases.     

皖西北平原地区农业劳动与非农业劳动报酬调查

使用家庭日记帐的方法统计农户的总收入、农业劳动时间和非农业劳动时间，然后对它们进行回归分析，得出的结论是，农户从事1小时的农业劳动（包括种植业和养殖业）所带来的家庭总收入的增加为21．9元，而从事1小时的非农业劳动（外出务工）的报酬是1．72元.     

健康对非农就业及其工资决定的影响

利用 1 993年中国营养调查数据 ,本文探讨了中国农村地区健康对非农就业及其工资决定的影响 ,并试图从微观层面揭示中国农村地区健康与收入之间的关系。本文的主要发现是 ,对于劳动参与及非农就业机会 ,健康状况都有显著的影响 ;然而在传统的种植业领域 ,健康并不是劳动参与的决定性因素 ;同时 ,在农村的非农就业者中 ,健康并不是劳动力市场表现的重要因素。尽管如此 ,由于非农就业机会对家庭收入的重要作用 ,我们仍不难发现健康在获取非农就业收入乃至增加家庭收入方面的作用     

The impact of rural electrification on income and education: Evidence from Bhutan

We investigate the impact of a rural electrification program on household income and children's schooling in rural Bhutan. Using propensity score matching, we find that electrification had a statistically significant impact on nonfarm income and education. Nonfarm income increased by 61 percent and children gained 0.72 additional years of schooling and 9 minutes of study time per day. We do not observe significant effects on farm income. Results are consistent and robust to different matching algorithms. Our findings indicate that investments in reducing energy deficit may help improve human welfare in Bhutan.     

Poverty and Income Dynamics in Philippine Villages, 1985–2004

The authors examined the long‐term changes in household income structure and decline in poverty in three rice‐growing villages in the rural Philippines from 1985 to 2004. They found a shift of household income structure away from farm to nonfarm sources, accompanied by a decline in the incidence of poverty by about one‐half. Such a decline can be explained primarily by the rise in returns to the “quantity” attributes of human capital, measured by age composition, and, secondly, by the rise in returns to the “quality” attributes, measured by the proportion of household members completing secondary and tertiary schooling. It is clear that the poor benefited from the development of the nonfarm labor market where they were able to fully utilize their only asset, that is unskilled labor.     

Human Capital, Productivity, and Stratification in Rural Pakistan

This paper investigates the effects of human capital on productivity using micro panel data of rural households in the North‐West Frontier Province, Pakistan, where a substantial job stratification is observed in terms of income and education. To clarify the mechanism underlying this stratification, the human capital effects are estimated for wages (individual level) and for self‐employed activities (household level), and for farm and non‐farm sectors. Estimation results show a clear contrast between farm and non‐farm sectors—wages and productivity in non‐farm activities rise with education at an increasing rate, whereas those in agriculture respond only to the primary education.     

The impacts of social pension on rural household expenditure: evidence from China

In 2009, China began to implement a new social pension scheme in rural areas. We examine the impacts of this social pension on two main components of rural household expenditure, consumption and agricultural production investment. Our findings show that on average, rural households increase consumption by 1–3% and agricultural investment by as high as 6–9% in pilot counties. Further estimations reveal that the pension mainly affects the households with old-aged members and the poorer families, and that the saving rate hasn’t been changed by the pension, which support more the contingent income than the life-cycle hypothesis. We also find that among various types of expenditures, the most dramatic increases have occurred in food consumption and operational inputs on agricultural production.     

Does agricultural cooperative membership influence off-farm work decisions of farm couples?

Membership in agricultural cooperatives may influence intra-household decisions regarding the division of household labor. However, the linkages between cooperative membership and labor allocation remain unexplored. To fill this gap, we examine the impact of cooperative membership on off-farm work decisions of couples engaged in farming, using data collected from 595 banana farmers in China. The recursive bivariate probit model and endogenous-treatment Poisson regression model are employed to address the self-selection bias inherent in cooperative membership. The results show that cooperative membership increases the probability of participating in off-farm work by 38% for husbands and 31% for wives. Having large households reduces the probability of husbands but increases that of wives working off-farm. Cooperative membership is also associated with more time spent on off-farm work and higher earnings for both husbands and wives. Our findings point to the potential of agricultural cooperatives to increase farm couples’ off-farm employment, thus increasing household income and quality of life.     

我国农业家庭经营的波动规律与演变趋势

改革开放以来,家庭经营一直受到来自城市化与农业经营环境两个方面因素的外生冲击.按照真实经济周期理论,农户对两种外生冲击预期收益率的变化造成了家庭经营投资费用的波动.首先将改革以来家庭经营波动划分为6个周期,然后运用真实经济周期理论对家庭经营的波动周期、波动幅度与演变趋势进行比较分析.研究结论表明,在新农村建设时期,随着城市化步伐逐步加快,以及政府增加对"三农"的投资、发展现代农业等外生冲击力度加大,传统的小农家庭经营必然向家庭农场制转型.而在家庭经营转型过程中,政府不应干预农户的自主选择,而应通过加大两种冲击的影响力度,引导家庭农场制应运而生.     

IMPACT OF COOPERATIVES MEMBERSHIP ON ECONOMY IN EASTERN OROMIA: THE CASE OF HARAMAYA AGRICULTURAL FARMERS’ COOPERATIVE UNION (HAFCU)

This study attempts to analyse the impact of cooperatives on the smallholders’ income, productivity, marketed surplus and saving in East Hararghe Zone of Haramaya District. The study is based on primary cross‐sectional data collected from cooperative member and non‐cooperative member household heads. The propensity score matching (PSM) estimates complemented by a bias correction matching (BCM) and Lewbel instrumental variable (IV) regression estimation shows that cooperatives have a positive impact on smallholders’ income and productivity. The findings have strong policy implications. The rural development of the country should work toward strengthening and expanding the existing rural organizations through training and capacity building programmes. It is important particularly establishing new rural‐based organizations that enable rural households to engage in business activities. Doing that may help reduce poverty and increase smallholders’ income, productivity, and capital accumulation.     

中日土地制度、非农兼业和城乡收入均衡的比较与启示

自耕农所有制是日本农地制度的基础,它所赋予的农民对土地的充分权利调动了他们的积极性,有效地提高了农业生产率,保证了日本粮食和各种农产品的充裕的供给;同时增加了农民的农业收入。日本工业,尤其是农村工业的迅速发展,促进了农民非农兼业收入的较快增长。农业收入和兼业收入的相互补充使日本农家收入在20世纪70年代以后达到或略超过城市家庭,实现了城乡收入均衡。在我国致力于缩小城乡收入差距、建设和谐社会的今天,日本经验值得我们借鉴。     

The effects of off‐farm work on fertilizer and pesticide expenditures in China

This study examines the effects of participation in off‐farm work on farm expenditures on fertilizer and pesticide, using farm household survey data from China. Simple mean value comparisons reveal no statistically significant differences in fertilizer and pesticide expenditures between off‐farm work participants and nonparticipants. However, econometric estimation with a treatment effects model shows a negative selection bias. After controlling for this bias, the empirical results show that participation in off‐farm work exerts a positive and statistically significant impact on fertilizer and pesticide expenditures. Our findings generally suggest that the income effect of off‐farm work stimulates agricultural production by increasing investments in productivity‐enhancing inputs.     

Remittances and income diversification in Bolivia’s rural sector

This article examines the role of remittances in income diversification strategies in Bolivia’s rural sector. Remittances can be consumed or invested by the recipient. As an investment, funds can be used for farming or to finance other nonfarm productions. In this article, we use a large and nationally representative survey to estimate the effect that remittances have on the probability of producing income from nonfarm activities (diversification) by using a bivariate probit model. Our evidence shows that remittances increase the probability that a rural family engages in nonfarm activities, at least in some regions of Bolivia. We also find evidence that the sender’s decision to remit and the recipient’s decision to diversify may be jointly determined. As such, this suggests that remittances may serve as a mechanism to overcome localized failures in Bolivia’s capital markets.