Farmers’ Preferences for Recycling Pesticide Packaging Waste: An Implication of a Discrete Choice Experiment Method

Recycling pesticide packaging wastes (PPWs) is important for promoting green development in agriculture and improving the rural ecological environment. However, limited studies have focused on the subsidy, reward, and punishment policies for the recycling of pesticide packaging wastes. Therefore, to fill the research gap, the main aim of this study was to analyze farmers’ preferences for different PPW recycling policies using a choice experiment method. Furthermore, the study identified farmers’ heterogeneous preferences to provide a decision-making base for the governments to formulate PPWs recycling policies. We used a random parameter logit and latent class model to approach study objectives. A well-structured questionnaire was used to collect data from 256 vegetable growers from the Hebei province of China. The results found that more than 80% of farmers used less than 30 g (mL) of pesticides, and more than 60% of farmers deeply buried the PPWs. In the study area, farmers preferred subsidy incentive policies and found it hard to accept the higher capacity specifications of pesticide packaging and punitive measures. Moreover, it is confirmed that farmers’ preferences for PPW recycling policies are heterogeneous, and 55.5% of farmers preferred incentive-type policies. Therefore, the government should establish a proper PPW recycling system with a subsidy-based incentive policy. Moreover, local agricultural officers should provide training to the farmers for recycling PPWs.