Does agricultural mechanization improve agricultural environment efficiency? Evidence from China’s planting industry

Abstract

It has important theoretical value and practical significance to study the impact of agricultural mechanization (AM) on agriculture environment efficiency (AEE), as AM is an important way to improve the level of rural modernization and accelerate the high-quality development of agriculture, while the increase of energy consumption of AM has brought greenhouse gas emissions. Using the panel data of 30 provinces in China from 2001 to 2019, this article adopts stochastic frontier analysis method with output oriented distance function to measure AEE based on net carbon sink, and empirically analyzes the impact of AM on AEE. The empirical analysis finds that the AEE of the whole country and all provinces shows an upward trend with time, and has significant spatial positive autocorrelation characteristics. There is a Kuznets inverted "U" relationship between AM and AEE.Meanwhile, AM has spatial spillover effect and time cumulative effect on AEE, and this basic conclusion is still robust after using instrumental variables, spatial autoregressive model, sub sample regression, changing spatial weight matrix and independent. Further research shows that the effect of AM on AEE depends on the input effect and output effect caused by AM, and the mechanism is mainly reflected in agricultural technology progress, expansion of the scale of agricultural operation, optimization of resource allocation and spatial spillover. Given these findings, the paper adds considerable value to the empirical literature and also provides various policy-and practical implications.

Can Agricultural Productive Services Promote Agricultural Environmental Efficiency in China?

“…Jiang et al believed that mechanization led to the decline of agricultural environmental performance based on the provincial data from 2000 to 2017 in China [ 5 ]. In the study of Zhu et al, the argument that mechanization and agricultural environmental efficiency presented an inverted U-shaped relationship was verified based on the study sample of China’s 30 provinces during 2001–2019 [ 7 ]. The reason for this inconsistency may lie in the inconsistency of the measurement methods and indicators of agricultural environmental efficiency adopted by them.…”

“…Following Zhu et al [ 7 ], we adopt the multi-output stochastic frontier analysis method, which is based on the output-oriented distance function, to obtain agricultural environmental efficiency. In terms of the production function form, we introduce a time-varying parameter model to estimate elastic changes across time accurately.…”

“…To solve the problem of endogeneity, the usual approach is to introduce a suitable instrumental variable [ 23 ]. Following Zhu et al [ 7 ], this paper adopts the ratio of road mileage to farmland area in the region as an instrumental variable for agricultural productive services. As the transportation infrastructure, roads do not directly impact agri-cultural output value and net carbon sinks, but they can improve the degree of agricultural productive services via improving road conditions and reducing transportation costs for agricultural machinery.…”

“…In terms of the external environment, agricultural development level [ 1 , 2 ], urbanization, natural disasters, production risk [ 3 ], innovation [ 4 ], and energy price [ 5 ] are taken into account. In terms of internal factors, agricultural structure [ 2 ], agricultural labor force, reservoir infrastructure construction, agricultural mechanization service organizations [ 5 ], as well as mechanization [ 5 , 6 , 7 ] are frequently mentioned.…”

“…Agricultural environmental efficiency is determined by agricultural inputs, outputs, and carbon emissions [ 7 ], which are influenced by agricultural productive services. In re-ality, agricultural productive services, also known as agricultural production outsourcing, refer to outsourcing some or all agricultural production stages to service providers or other farmers [ 12 ].…”