Study on Chinese farmer cooperative economy organization and agricultural specialization

Abstract

Under the background of the Chinese Household Contract Responsibility System (HCRS), farmers have to pay higher transaction costs and encounter a huge trading risk if they engage in agricultural production only through the market transaction. Since the special properties of agricultural production limit the formation and development of agricultural enterprises, farmer cooperative economy organizations with the main functional characteristics of transaction coordination begin to flourish. By building a new classical economics model, this paper demonstrates the theoretical assertion that the generation of a farmer cooperative economy organization is accompanied by the evolution of the division of labour, the improvement of farmers' effectiveness and the development of agricultural specialization. Furthermore, this paper does an empirical analysis with the micro-survey data to verify this theoretical assertion. Therefore, this article effectively explains the generation condition of a farmer cooperative economy organization and the internal mechanism of how it promotes the development of agricultural specialization. So this paper provides a strong theoretical and practical evidence for the development of a farmer cooperative economy organization and agricultural specialization.

What Are the Effects of Participation in Production Outsourcing? Evidence from Chinese Apple Farmers

“…Family resource endowment constraints and lower transaction costs are both important factors promoting the outsourcing of agricultural production [18][19][20][21][22][23]. Studies on the welfare effects of outsourcing have confirmed that the outsourcing of agricultural production can reduce production costs and improve production efficiency [24][25][26], strengthen the specialized division of labor and promote agricultural scale operations [27], and improve the degree of organization of agricultural production [28]. The available research has theoretically analyzed and empirically tested the decision-making behaviors of farmers with respect to agricultural production outsourcing using behavior choice theory, the production function model, and the property rights theory from the perspectives of the differentiation of farmers' roles [29], the differences in cultivation scale [30], the differences in the attributes of production links [31], and transaction characteristics and the capacity for subjective behavior [27,32].…”

The Relationship Analysis between Service Performances of Milk Producer Cooperative with the Dairy Farm Performance of Members

“…Yang & Liu (2012) stated that the farmer cooperative formed by a series of contracts and on the principle of reciprocity could reduce transaction costs. Kunte & Patankar (2015) stated that cooperatives have positive impact on milk production and income generation.…”

The Effect of Heterogeneous Environmental Regulations on Carbon Emission Efficiency of the Grain Production Industry: Evidence from China’s Inter-Provincial Panel Data

“…In addition, an innovation of green high-yield technology will trigger a chain reaction, which will stimulate farmers' intention for scientific and technological innovation again. The gathering of competitors' grain planting industry will also promote green technology innovation and force other grain producers to carry out technological innovation [53]. The production agglomeration of the grain planting industry will also increase the income of grain farmers so that farmers have sufficient funds to participate in the environmental governance of grain planting when facing environmental regulations, thus improving the carbon emission efficiency of the grain planting industry.…”