A study of the impact of policy-based agricultural insurance on farmers’ willingness to adopt pro-environmentally production behaviors: evidence from Jiangxi Province in China

Abstract

Introduction: The problem of agricultural non-point source pollution in China seriously affects the sustainability of grain production and poses a great threat to food security. The key to solving the problem of agricultural non-point source pollution is to change farmers’ past agricultural production methods at the source of production and make them adopt pro-environmental agricultural production behaviors. Policy-based agricultural insurance can incentivize farmers’ willingness to adopt pro-environmental production behaviors by reducing their production risks and protecting their agricultural income. Methods: Based on the theory of farmers’ behavior and the theory of planned behavior, this paper empirically analyzes the influence mechanism of policy-based agricultural insurance on farmers’ willingness to adopt pro-environmental production behaviors in Jiangxi Province, China, through the establishment of the OLS model and the Ordered-Logit model. In addition, this paper also explores the mediating roles of planting scale, planting structure and risk attitude through the mediating effect model and Bootstrap method. Results: The main findings of this paper are as follows: (1) Policy-based agricultural insurance can effectively enhance farmers’ adoption willingness to adopt pro-environmental production willingness. (2) Policy-based agricultural insurance can enhance farmers’ pro-environmental production willingness by incentivizing them to expand the scale of planting. (3) Policy-based agricultural insurance can increase farmers’ pro-environmental production willingness by changing their risk attitudes and increasing their risk preferences. Discussion: Based on the results of the study, this paper suggests that the government should continue to optimize the policy-based agricultural insurance products, expand the coverage, improve the payout process, increase the payout capacity, and enhance its stimulating effect on farmers’ willingness to adopt pro-environmental production behaviors.