How Smallholder Farmers are Moving towards Agricultural Organisation:Evidence from the Return of Migrant Workers to Farm Households
Agricultural organisation is an important element of Chinese-style agricultural modernisation.The compensation of agricultural human capital formed by returning migrant workers is of great practical significance in promoting the transformation of smallholder household organisation from passive to active.This paper empirically analyses the impact of the return of migrant workers on the organisation of agriculture using data from the 2017 China Rural Household Tracking Survey.The study finds that:(1)The return of migrant workers significantly promotes the organised operation of farm households,and improves the degree of contractualisation,co-operation and division of labour in farm production.(2)Mechanism analysis shows that the enhancement of human capital,including contractual spirit,sense of cooperation and entrepreneurial spirit,is an important transmission path for returning farm households to achieve agricultural organisation.(3)Heterogeneity analysis shows that the impact of returning migrant workers on agricultural organisation varies across the length of time spent working away from home,the location of working away from home,and the nature of the work performed away from home.Among them,there is an inverted U-shaped relationship between the length of time spent working outside the farm and agricultural organisation;compared with the western regions,the degree of agricultural organisation of returning migrant workers is deeper in the central and eastern regions;and compared with the temporary work experience,returning migrant workers with self-employment or formal work experience have a greater impact on the organisation of agricultural management.This paper argues that in order to reduce the human capital constraints in the process of smallholder organised participation,it is important not only to enhance the human capital of on-farm workers,but also to pay attention to the human capital formed through migratory pathways,and to focus on the transformative role of returning migrant workers with heterogeneous human capital in traditional agriculture.
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