Productivity effect and overuse of pesticide in crop production in China

Chinese farmers are often accused of overusing pesticides that play a crucial role in enhancing crop yield by reducing losses to crop pests. Pesticide overuse has caused a series of negative health and environmental externalities. This paper quantifies the productivity effect and the optimal amount of pesticides in rice, cotton and maize production in China from the economic perspective. Using survey data collected in 2012 and 2013, both Cobb-Douglas and Weibull damage control specifications are used to estimate the production function. Results show that pesticides have statistically significant productivity effect on crop yield. On the condition of Weibull damage control specifications, the marginal products of 1 kg of the active ingredients of pesticides for rice, cotton and maize are 71.06, 22.73 and 98.45 kg, respectively. However, 57, 64 and 17% of the actual amount of pesticides are overused for rice, cotton and maize, respectively. Moreover, the productivity effect of pesticides would be overestimated using Cobb-Douglas specification without incorporating a damage control agent.