Research On The Impact Of Social Networks On Mountain Farmers’ Participation Behavior And Degree In E-commerce

In the context of digital agriculture,the rapid development trend of China’s agricultural products e-commerce has become a powerful engine to boost the rapid development of the agricultural economy.Agricultural products e-commerce has dramatically made up for the shortcomings of traditional offline sales channels,including promoting the smooth flow of information on supply and demand of agricultural products,reducing intermediate circulation links,broadening the sales channels of agricultural products,etc.,significantly promoting the compelling connection between small farmers and large markets.Especially for farmers in mountainous areas,agricultural products e-commerce has opened up a broad road conducive to local agricultural products going out of the mountainous regions and going further,which is of great significance for farmers in mountainous areas to increase their incomes and become rich.For China to build a moderately prosperous society,the most considerable development shortboard is rural.The most significant difficulty of rural development is in the mountainous areas.However,the development process of agricultural products e-commerce in mountainous regions is not optimistic,"how to solve the real dilemma of low willingness or low degree participation of farmers in mountainous areas in e-commerce" has become a major concern of current scholars and agricultural products e-commerce operators.Considering that rural China is a typical relational society,a farmer’s information acquisition and production and management decisions are primarily influenced by the social network.The different information acquired through the social network may also lead to differences in farmers’ behavioral choices.Therefore,from the perspective of social networks,we study the impact of social network and its differentiated types on farmers’ participation behavior and degree in e-commerce in mountainous areas in the process of agricultural product sales.We test whether there is a mediating effect of information acquisition in the influence of social networks and its differentiated types on farmers’ participation behavior and degree in e-commerce,to clarify the influence mechanism of social networks and its differentiated types on farmers’ participation behavior and degree in agricultural product e-commerce.So as to put forward corresponding policy suggestions for the government to guide mountain farmers to actively participate in agricultural products e-commerce and promote farmers’ income increase.First,we summarize a series of domestic and foreign researches on social networks,information acquisition of farmers,the development status of agricultural product e-commerce,farmers’ willingness and behavior to participate in e-commerce,and the impact of social networks on farmers’ technology adoption behavior.On this basis,the general situation of the electric business development in Zigui County,Hubei Province was summarized.We selected Guojiaba Town and Guizhou Town,which are representative of the navel orange e-commerce in Zigui County,Hubei Province,as research areas to conduct a questionnaire survey and then obtained 417 valid questionnaires.Using the binary logistic model,conducts an empirical analysis of the participation in agricultural products e-commerce of farmers in mountainous areas from the perspective of social network and performs group estimation and intermediary effect testing.Next,this paper extracts sample farmers who have participated in agricultural product e-commerce,analyzes the impact of social network and its differentiated types on the degree of farmers’ participation in e-commerce,and performs group estimation and intermediary effect testing.The results show that:(1)The comprehensive social network indicators have a significant positive impact on whether mountain farmers participate in e-commerce and the degree of participation in e-commerce.From the perspective of the types of social network differentiation,the traditional social networks have a significant positive effect on the degree of farmers’ participation in e-commerce at a statistical level of 10%.The new social network has a significant positive impact on whether farmers experience in e-commerce and the degree of participation in e-commerce,and the significance levels are 5% and 10% respectively;(2)For farmers with different education levels,the influence of social network and its differentiation types on their participation behavior and degree in e-commerce is distinct.As follows: for farmers with low education levels,traditional social networks have a significant favorable influence on their participation in e-commerce,and the significance level is 5%.The new social network has a significant positive effect on the degree of their participation in e-commerce,the significance level is 1%.For the high education group,the traditional social network has a significant positive effect on their degree of participation in e-commerce,the significance level is 1%.The new social network has a significant positive impact on their participation in e-commerce and the degree of their participation in e-commerce,and the significance levels are 5% and 10%respectively.(3)In terms of farmers’ characteristics,whether to participate in e-commerce training,the family’s highest degree of education,and the equipment of home mobile phone and computer have a significant positive impact on whether farmers participate in e-commerce.The family’s overall health and the number of planting years have a significant positive impact on the degree of farmers’ participation in e-commerce.Age has a significant negative impact on the degree of farmer’s participation in e-commerce.Whether to join agricultural production cooperatives has a significant positive impact on whether farmers participate in e-commerce and the degree of participation in e-commerce.In terms of the external environment of e-commerce,the economic benefits of local navel orange e-commerce have a significant positive impact on whether farmers participate in e-commerce,and the density of local express logistics has a significant positive impact on the degree of farmers’ participation in e-commerce.Finally,based on the empirical analysis,in order to promote mountain farmers’ active participation in agricultural products e-commerce,broaden the sales channels of agricultural products,and improve farmers’ income.We put forward the following suggestions as follows.(1)Consolidate and enhance the construction of traditional social network;(2)Extend and broaden the boundaries of new social network;(3)Focus on improving the information acquisition ability of mountain farmers;(4)Promote educational resources to tilt towards mountainous areas and improve mountain farmers’ education;(5)Carry out various forms of e-commerce technical training and enhance the effectiveness of e-commerce training;(6)Encourage mountain farmers to join agricultural production cooperatives and carry out e-commerce sales based on the cooperatives.