Research On The Influencing Factorsof Pear Farmers’ Production Behavior At Different Scales

Agriculture is the foundation of the national economy.The 20 th National Congress of the Party clearly proposed for the first time to "accelerate the building of a strong agricultural country".To realize the revitalization of the countryside and accelerate the modernization of agriculture and rural areas,industrial development is the key.Therefore,to study the current economic situation and policy orientation of China,we must first start with agricultural production.As the main body of agricultural production,farmers need to grasp the characteristics of their production behavior and the influencing factors,and then take measures to improve their production efficiency,in order to promote the steady growth of the pear industry.Based on the theory of farmer behavior,optimal farmer theory,and scale economy theory,this paper divides farmer scale into four levels: small scale,small and medium scale,medium and large scale,and constructs multiple linear regression model,Ordered-Probit model,and stochastic frontier production function model based on 630 microscopic research data in Weixi an County,Hebei Province,and analyzes the production behavior of farmers in terms of their production input behavior and production technology selection behavior.We analyzed the production behaviors of farmers of different planting scales and their influencing factors,and explored the production efficiency of farmers of different scales and their distribution.The main findings are as follows:First,the production input behavior of farmers is influenced by personal characteristics,family business characteristics,and external environmental characteristics,and there are significant differences in production input influencing factors among scale zones.The larger the planting area of pear trees,the more the price meets the expectation,the younger the age,the smaller the proportion of pear fruit income,the more production inputs of small-scale farmers.The younger the age,the larger the proportion of pear fruit income,the more production inputs for small and medium scale farmers.The larger the planting area,land transfer,the higher the number of years of education,the more production inputs of medium and large-scale farmers.The larger the planting area,the epidemic affects the purchase of production materials to a lesser extent,the occurrence of land transfer,join the cooperative to promote large-scale farmers production inputs.Second,the number of farmers’ choice of production technology increased with the increase of planting scale,and the factors influencing the technology choice behavior of farmers of different scales varied greatly.The main factors influencing the technology selection behavior of small-scale farmers are household decision makers,part-time employment,policy satisfaction,the number of times of training by the agricultural technology department,risk preference,and whether to take disaster measures;for smalland medium-scale farmers,the influencing factors are planting area,age,years of education,part-time employment,policy satisfaction,the number of times of training by the agricultural technology department,and whether to take disaster measures;for medium-and large-scale farmers,the influencing factors are years of education,part-time employment,and the number of times of training by the agricultural technology department.The influencing factors for medium-and large-scale farmers were the number of years of education,part-time employment and the number of trainings by the agricultural technology department,and for large-scale farmers,the influencing factors were the cultivated area and age.Thirdly,planting area,fertilizer,water and electricity costs,fruit bags,family labor inputs,and hired labor input factors all positively affected the increase of pear fruit yield.Pesticide and machinery inputs were not significant.The average technical efficiency of the total sample of pear farmers was 67.6%,and the current production technology level was low,which could be increased by 32.4% if inefficiency losses were eliminated.There is a significant difference in production efficiency level between different scale groups,with the expansion of business scale,the average production efficiency increases first and then decreases,showing an "inverted U shape".Fourth,from the regression results of the production inefficiency function,the "inverted U-shaped" relationship between land size and production efficiency is verified.The age variable did not pass the significance test,and the years of education had a positive effect on productivity.The longer the farmers’ family planted pears,the richer the accumulated experience in fine management of pear fruit,and the lower the production inefficiency loss,which positively affects the improvement of production efficiency.The more family labor involved in planting,the more production inefficiency loss,that is,it has a negative effect on production efficiency.Bagging,using biological pesticides on promoting pear fruit to improve production efficiency,and participating in agricultural insurance helps to improve production efficiency.According to the findings of the study,the following countermeasures are proposed:(1)respect the subject status of small farmers and improve the level of resource allocation;(2)encourage land transfer and promote large-scale production;(3)improve literacy level of farmers and promote scientific production.