| Farmers' production management is the basic part to guarantee the quality and safety of agricultural products.However,the small-scale production and scattered nature of China's agricultural products lead to the production supervision costly and inefficient.Scholars put forward the strategic plan of “Internet + Modern Agriculture” by rebuilding the agricultural service platform,developing refined and precise management models,and improving the quality and safety traceability system of agricultural and sideline products,in order to reshape consumer confidence in the safety of agricultural products.But the implementation cost is too high to be realized.This study believes that the development of the Internet will reduce the cost of obtaining information for farmers,and at the same time,it will contribute to the spontaneous and safe production of farmers.Basing on information diffusion,information feedback,and information sharing of the Internet,the paper analyzes that Internet usage will be beneficial to regulating and incentivizing safe production of farmers and affirming the important role of informatization in agricultural development and transformation.In particularly,the paper used the sample data of 585 apple growers obtained from field surveys in seven villages in three cities Shaanxi Province in May 2017,using fertilization practices and integrated pest management techniques to characterize the safe production of farmers in two aspects.An empirical test of Internet usage(agricultural information,purchase of agricultural resources,and learning technology by internet)is helpful to the safety production of apple farmers.The specific contents and conclusions are as follows:1.The impact of internet use on fertility behavior of apple growers.First,this section uses the seemingly unrelated bivariate probit(SUBP)model to test whether there are unobserved variables affecting Internet use and fertilization behavior at the same time.The results show that there are no missing variables between use of fertilization and Internet usage.There is no endogenous problem between the use of the Internet and farmyard fertilizer usage,so the probit model is used to test the impact of Internet usage on farmer fertilizer investment and found that Internet usage has no effect on the investment.At the same time,the SUBP model shows that endogenous nature due to unobserved variables between Internet usage and fertilizer investment,organic fertilizer investment.Therefore,we further use the recursive bivariate probit model to control endogenous problems.The unbiased estimates of the effects of applying farmyard manure and organic manure showed that the use of the Internet resulted in 9.12% reduction in the probability of application of chemical fertilizers for apple and 42.13% increase in the probability of organic fertilizers investment.Finally,the tobit model was used to estimate the impact of Internet usage on the amount of fertilizers and organic fertilizer inputs.The results show that Internet usage has a negative effect on the investment of chemical fertilizers,but it is not significant;Internet usage has a significant positive impact on the amount of organic fertilizer inputs.2.The impact of internet usage on the adoption of integrated pest management technology for apple farmers.In order to control the endogenous problems caused by selectivity bias and missing variables,this section employs the endogenous switching probit(ESP)model to analyze the impact of Internet usage on the adoption of IPM technology for farmers.The results of the study indicate that there is indeed selection bias that arises from both observed and unobserved heterogeneities.Therefore,it cannot be rejected that Internet use and IPM technology adoption are endogenous.By calculating the average processing effect of Internet use on IPM technology adoption,ATT results show that Internet usage can increase the adoption probability of IPM technology by 32.91%,and ATU results show that the adoption probability of technology increases by 15.38%.Dividing rural households into cooperative members and nonmembers,it was found that Internet usage has a significantly higher influence on probability of IPM adoption for cooperative members farmers than nonmembers farmers.Finally,a treatment effect model was used to control the selectivity bias caused by observable and unobservable variables,and the effect of IPM technology adoption on apple yield was analyzed.The results show that the adoption of IPM technology is conducive to increasing the output of apples.This section proves that Internet usage can increase the probability of farmers adopting IPM technology which is beneficial to apple production in orchards.Based on the above findings,in order to ensure the quality and safety of agricultural products and further enhance the safety of farmer households in China,the following policy implications are summarized: On the one hand,relevant government departments should use the Internet and other modern information methods to innovate agricultural technology promotion methods and build agricultural network services.Platforms,providing precision agricultural technology services,and building a platform for farmers to search with high quality,authentic content,and friendly interfaces.The agricultural technical training should also be changed from “giving people the fish” to “teaching people to fish”,so that farmers can acquire information search technology,greatly increase the ability of farmers to acquire information,and increase the level of safety planting through self-learning.On the other hand,it is important to encourage farmers to try Online sales channels such as Taobao and WeChat which allow farmers to directly participate in the sales of agricultural products.The shortened transaction chain allows farmers to obtain higher profits.At the same time,consumers' high demands for quality are timely and effectively fed back to farmers through the Internet.It can be strengthened to help farmers improve agricultural cultivation and promote safety production. |
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