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Background: Although a great deal of research has examined the impact of socialized pest control service, few studies have discussed the relationship between socialized pest control service and pesticide use intensity. In particular, the literature ignores the impact of advanced application technologies (drone sprayers) on the intensity of pesticide use by farmers., Results: Based on a survey of 1185 rice growers in Hubei Province, China, this study found that 64.13% of the sample farmers used pesticides more than three times in one rice season. Importantly, socialized pest control services have a significant negative effect on the pesticide use intensity of farmers. Compared to the sample that did not purchase the service, farmers who purchased socialized pest control services demonstrated 9.30% less pesticide intensity. Further, there was a significant difference among farmers using different application devices on pesticide use intensity. Compared to the sample using ground backpack sprayers, farmers using drone sprayers used 12.40% less pesticide intensity., Conclusion: This study found that the frequency of pesticide use by farmers during rice cultivation was generally high. Socialized pest control services have played a positive role in reducing the intensity of pesticide use, especially with the more obvious pesticide reduction effect of the adoption of drone sprayers. Therefore, improving socialized pest control services and promoting advanced equipment such as drone sprayers may be an important way to reduce the use of pesticides in China. © 2023 Society of Chemical Industry., (© 2023 Society of Chemical Industry.)

Background: Although scholars have elaborated on the effects of aging, there is no consensus on the relationship between the aging and farmers' pesticide input. Regional differences in agricultural crops in China, namely 'Southern Rice and Northern Wheat', have not been considered in any of the existing studies., Results: Based on the data of 443 wheat farmers and 324 rice farmers in China, this study found that aging significantly increased pesticide input. After sorting out the types of pesticides, it was found that the aging significantly increased the input of biological pesticides, but did not affect the input of chemical pesticides. After considering the planting pattern of 'Southern Rice and Northern Wheat', aging did not have a significant impact on the pesticide input of wheat farmers, but had a significant positive impact on the pesticide input of rice farmers. For wheat farmers in the north, social services have a significant inhibitory effect on the relationship between aging and pesticide input. For rice farmers, path dependence has a significant role in promoting the relationship between aging and pesticide input., Conclusion: The planting pattern of 'Southern Rice and Northern Wheat' will indeed affect the relationship between aging and pesticide input, and social services and path dependence are the main reasons for this heterogeneity effect. Therefore, improving agricultural socialization services and reducing farmers' dependence on traditional production experience will be an important way to effectively reduce the impact of aging. © 2023 Society of Chemical Industry., (© 2023 Society of Chemical Industry.)

Based on the successful experience of pesticide reduction in China, this study uses survey data from Hubei Province to measure rice farmers' technology preferences for pesticide reduction considering their needs, and compare the heterogeneous factors influencing farmers' adoption behavior. The results show that large-scale farmers prefer drone services and efficient machinery, while small-scale farmers prefer scientific standards and biopesticides for pesticide reduction. Second, farmers' adoption behavior of pesticide reduction technologies is mostly influenced by education, risk attitude, income, agricultural labor, scale, rice price, residue testing, brand, training, subsidy, and demonstration. Among them, education, risk attitude, scale, rice price, cost, and training, significantly affect farmers' adoption level of multiple pesticide reduction technologies. Further, higher rice prices and participation in training could promote the use of pesticide reduction technologies in a larger area by farmers. Therefore, the real needs of farmers should be focused on the promotion of pesticide reduction technologies, and pesticide reduction programs in different regions should carry out precise intervention policies. These findings can provide practical policy guidance for effective pesticide reduction in the central region of China., (© 2022. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

Background: Although scholars have become increasingly concerned about finding ways to encourage more farmers to use biopesticides and fewer to use chemical pesticides, few studies have investigated the prevalence of Chinese rice farmers' mixed use of biopesticides and chemical pesticides for pest management., Results: Based on a household survey in Hubei Province, China, this study found that 59.18% of the sample rice farmers used a mix of biopesticides and chemical pesticides. There is mainly a complementarity relationship between rice farmers' decision to use biopesticides and chemical pesticides. The pursuit of multiple production purposes is the main reason why farmers decide on the mixed-use of pesticides. Specifically, farmers generally tend to use biopesticides to ensure food safety for consumption, and chemical pesticides to reduce costs for profitability. The decision of farmers to mix pesticides has led to an increase of pesticide varieties and costs. However, it reduces the frequency of pesticide use, and does not result in a significant increase in rice yield and output value., Conclusion: While food safety should be emphasized in working towards greater use of biopesticides, rice farmers' mixed use of biopesticides and chemical pesticides will remain for a long time until the biotechnology is more developed. In fact, programs that investigate the effects of a combination of biopesticides and chemical pesticides should be implemented to achieve pesticide reduction, because biopesticides and chemical pesticides have specific disadvantages. © 2022 Society of Chemical Industry., (© 2022 Society of Chemical Industry.)

Pesticide overuse is still prevalent in many developing countries. And improving farmers' pest control ability is considered to be the key to achieve pesticide reduction. Based on the survey data of 822 rice farmers from Hubei, Jiangxi, and Zhejiang provinces in the Yangtze River Basin, we demonstrated the impact of pest control ability and technical guidance on farmers' pesticide overuse. We find that rice farmers' insufficient pest control ability does not necessarily lead to pesticide overuse, which depends on whether there is external technical guidance. The technical guidance of government agrotechnical stations and pesticide retailers can weaken pesticide overuse caused by lack of personal ability. In terms of sample, variable and method substitution, the above estimated results are still robust. In addition, we find that different subjects and links of pesticide technical guidance will bring different impacts. The technical guidance of agrotechnical stations mainly plays a role in the time and type of pesticide application, while the pesticide retailers mainly play a role in the time and dosage of pesticide application. This paper emphasizes that strengthening the guidance and regulation of pesticide technology guidance subject is also an efficient way of pesticide reduction. This will help to improve the effect of agricultural extension and accelerate the realization of pesticide reduction target in China., (© 2021. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

The influence of farmers' production experience on pesticide overuse is empirically analyzed by an endogenous switching probit model of pesticide use time, type, and dosage, based on survey data of 836 rice farmers in the Yangtze River Basin of China. We find that farmers' production experience is an important cause of pesticide overuse, especially for small-scale farmers. Older, self-sufficient, small-scale, non-cooperative members and rice farmers with distant market towns are more likely to use pesticides based on their personal experience. In terms of pesticide use time, type, and dosage, 35.26%, 30.10%, and 28.52% of the samples, respectively, relied on a decision based on "experience." Among them, farmers' decision-making based on production experience for pesticide type and dosage are the key causes of pesticide overuse. These results will be helpful for reducing pesticides and correcting farmers' "bad habits" within agricultural ecosystems.

Although the beneficial effects of the agricultural extension of farmers' biopesticides adoption have been largely demonstrated, the questions of what approaches can better extend biopesticides and how to improve their effectiveness still need to be explored. In a survey of 1148 rice farmers in Hubei Province, China, the technology supply and demand theory is used to explain the low efficiency of biopesticides extension. The endogenous switching probit model is used to estimate the impact of biopesticides technology publicity, training, demonstration and subsidies on farmers' adoption. The results show that biopesticides extension can promote rice farmers' adoption probability by 10.3 ~ 11.7%. And technology demonstration is currently the best way to extend biopesticides. Moreover, inadequate supply and demand of biopesticides are important for explaining the inefficiency of biopesticides extension in China. Extending biopesticides is better for farmers with smaller scales, younger ages, and lower education and for those who are cooperative members. Therefore, we should not only actively conduct biopesticides demonstration but also more importantly induce farmers' biopesticides demand and secure the market supply of biopesticide products. These findings will provide useful guidance for biopesticides extension and pesticides reduction in China and other developing countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Au-Ag OHCs-based SERS sensor coupled with CNN to detect pesticides has proposed. • Au-Ag OHCs served as the substrate with EF = 4.837 × 106 were synthesized. • Automatic updating of learning rate makes CNN model converge to local optimum. • A robust SERS sensor were developed with a LOD of 0.286 and 29 ppb. • Nonlinear correlation between pesticides and SERS data was diagnosed by APaRPs method. Pesticide residue detection in food has become increasingly important. Herein, surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) coupled with an intelligent algorithm was developed for the rapid and sensitive detection of pesticide residues in tea. By employing octahedral Cu 2 O templates, Au-Ag octahedral hollow cages (Au-Ag OHCs) were developed, which improved the surface plasma effect via rough edges and hollow inner structure, amplifying the Raman signals of pesticide molecules. Afterward, convolutional neural network (CNN), partial least squares (PLS), and extreme learning machine (ELM) algorithms were applied for the quantitative prediction of thiram and pymetrozine. CNN algorithms performed optimally for thiram and pymetrozine, with correlation values of 0.995 and 0.977 and detection limits (LOD) of 0.286 and 29 ppb, respectively. Accordingly, no significant difference (P greater than 0.05) was observed between the developed approach and HPLC in detecting tea samples. Hence, the proposed Au-Ag OHCs-based SERS technique could be utilized for quantifying thiram and pymetrozine in tea. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• We study the effects of agricultural insurance on pesticide application in China. • Purchasing agricultural insurance helps to encourage farmers to apply biological pesticides. • Purchasing agricultural insurance reduce the use of chemical pesticides. • Agricultural insurance can reduce the risk of applying biological pesticides. • Moral hazard is an important factor in encouraging farmers to apply biological pesticides. Based on the survey data from farmers in Hubei, Jiangxi, and Zhejiang provinces, this paper constructs a theoretical model of the impact of agricultural insurance on farmers' biopesticide application behavior. Furthermore, it adopts the endogenous switching probit model to empirically analyze the effect of agricultural insurance on farmers' biopesticide application behavior. We also estimate the probability that farmers will buy agricultural insurance and apply biological pesticides under the counterfactual framework. The results show that, first, 59.12% of the farmers in the sample area have purchased agricultural insurance and that 62.45% of the farmers have used biological pesticides. Second, the overall average treatment effect is 0.082. This indicates that, if all farmers buy agricultural insurance, the probability that farmers will apply biological pesticides increases by 8.2%. It can be seen that purchasing agricultural insurance encourages farmers to apply biological pesticides. Third, purchasing agricultural insurance can encourage farmers to increase the use of biological pesticides and reduce the use of chemical pesticides. In addition, purchasing agricultural insurance increases the ratio of the amount of biological pesticides to chemical pesticides. This finding shows that agricultural insurance can increase the relative importance of biological pesticides. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]