Assessing impact of risk perception and environmental regulation on household carcass waste recycling behaviour in China

Abstract

Carcass waste recycling exerts an important influence on preventing epidemic diseases, improving the ecological environment, and promoting sustainable development of the livestock industry although it has rarely aroused widespread attention throughout the world. Based on the data of 470 households engaged in breeding pigs in Hebei, Henan, and Hubei, China, and considering dead pigs as an example, this study employed the Double Hurdle model to assess impact of risk perception on household dead pig recycling behaviour and further tested the moderating effects of environmental regulation on the impact of risk perception on household dead pig recycling behaviour. The results show that: (1) Risk perception has a positive and significant influence on household dead pig recycling behaviour; however, this influence is mainly caused by households’ production and public health safety risk perceptions. Food and ecological safety risk perceptions have no significant influence on household dead pig recycling behaviour. (2) Environmental regulation has enhanced moderating effects on the impact of risk perception on household dead pig recycling behaviour, but the moderating effects mainly arose from imperative, guiding, and voluntary regulations. A moderating effect of incentive regulation is not obvious. (3) The moderating effects of environmental regulations present strong heterogeneity when different breeding scales and recycling technical attributes are considered. Finally, some policy implications, such as improving households’ risk perception level, enhancing environmental regulation intensity, and classifying to formulate measures, are proposed.

Risk Preference, Health Risk Perception, and Environmental Exposure Nexus: Evidence from Rural Women as Pig Breeders, China

“…In other words, only when the inhibitory effect of health risk perception is higher than the promotion effect of risk preference, the environmental exposure of women breeders may be at a lower degree. Consistent with the findings of Bryan and Kandulu (2011) and Si et al (2020), who considered that risk perception could enable farmers to strengthen risk management and implement risk intervention by evaluating the degree of risk damage, calculating the ratio of cost-benefit, and measuring the margin and expected utility. Suppose women breeders' health risk perception is higher.…”

“…Hence, although women breeders probably allow manure pollution and don't dispose of it harmlessly, they still can enhance the level of health risk perception through communication with other breeders, news media, or government agendas. The high cost of manure cycling, the weak incentive of government support, and the concealment of risk realization make health risk perception vulnerable and drive individuals' towards environmental pollution (Si et al, 2020). Our research showed that a higher degree of risk preference has become a key determinant of rural women breeders' exposure to severe LPM pollution.…”

“…In fact, in light of the specific research object, small and medium-scale women breeders in rural areas are focused rather than large-scale breeding companies or farms, with a higher manure disposal capability, less human capital investment, and a higher degree of standardized breeding (Wang et al, 2019). The economic structure and social relationships embedded in different breeding scales are heterogeneous (Si et al, 2020). Taking a breeding scale as a classification standard can deeply explain the heterogeneity of women breeders' environmental exposure in this research.…”

“…Bryan and Kandulu (2011) also stated that public health risk awareness has a positive and significant influence on farmers' participation in manure waste management. Si et al (2020) believed that health risk perception exerts a positive and statistically influence on farmers' recycling behavior of carcass waste. Besides, some scholars also argued that, due to the heterogeneity of risk preference and risk perception, there is a crossed association between risk preference and risk perception, affecting individual risk decision-making behavior such as purchasing insurance and adopting conservation tillage (Lopes, 1986;Turvey et al, 2012).…”

“…Furthermore, in China, farmland transfer arouses surplus rural laborers, and the men urban-rural migration work has become the main labor distribution in rural families (Cao et al, 2020;Zhang et al, 2020;Si et al 2020). Coupled with the demand for caring for the elderly and nurturing children, the women had also taken the responsibility of breeding livestock and poultry to subsidize the family income (Song et al, 2020).…”