Labor endowment, productive services and farmers' adoption of ecological agriculture: Taking rice-crayfish co-culture model as an example

Despite growing emphasis on ecological agriculture, limited attention has been examined how labor endowment and productive services to shape farmers' adoption decisions. This study investigates the synergistic role of labor endowment and productive services in adopting the rice-crayfish co-culture model, using 2023 survey data from small-scale farmers in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River. The results show that labor endowment is a key driver of adoption. Both labor quantity and labor quality increase the likelihood of adoption, by 17.5 % and 3.1 % per additional unit, respectively. Productive services further strengthen these effects. Seedling provision and agricultural supply services mainly amplify the effect of labor quality endowment, while planting and disease prevention services reinforce the overall influence of labor endowment. Marketing services play a distinctive role in enhancing the contribution of labor quality to adoption behavior. Heterogeneity analysis reveals that the positive impact of labor endowment is considerably stronger among production oriented farmers, new business subjects, large-scale grain growers, and farmers with better cultivated land conditions than among subsistence and small-scale farmers. Mechanism analysis shows that labor endowment promotes adoption mainly by improving farmers' ability to learn and master ecological production technologies. The study advances theoretical understanding by demonstrating that productive services in complex ecological agricultural systems operate under a complementarity logic, rather than functioning as substitutes for household labor. These findings provide new empirical evidence on the multidimensional mechanisms linking labor endowment, service provision, and ecological technology adoption.