Learning behavior, environmental awareness, and agricultural waste management of banana farmers in China

Abstract

Chemical packaging waste from pesticides in agricultural lands may cause chronic environmental pollution and health issues if disposed of inappropriately. Using data collected from 632 banana farmers in China through stratified random sampling, we employed the endogenous switching probit model to estimate the relationship between learning behavior and farmers' environmental awareness, and the treatment effect model to examine the association between environmental awareness and farmers' chemical packaging waste disposal behavior. The results show that farmers who participated (vs. did not participate) in self-learning and social learning had greater awareness of environmental protection. Additionally, farmers with greater (vs. less) environmental awareness tended to dispose of chemical waste at appropriate trash sites, underscoring the positive role of environmental awareness in the management of pesticide packaging waste for promoting sustainable agriculture. Implications of the findings are discussed.