Risk cognition, agricultural cooperatives training, and farmers' pesticide overuse: Evidence from Shandong Province, China

INTRODUCTION: Pesticides are widely and excessively used in the world. Reducing pesticide overuse is an important measure to protect the environment and human health. METHODS: Based on the survey data of 518 farmers in Shandong Province, China, using the Logit model to empirically test the effect of risk cognition on farmers' pesticide overuse behavior and the moderating effect of cooperatives training on the effect of risk cognition on farmers' pesticide overuse behavior. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION: We found that 21.24% of farmers overused pesticides. The three dimensions of risk cognition have significant negative effects on farmers' behavior of excessive pesticide use, among which the human health risk cognition has the largest impact (0.74), followed by food safety risk cognition (0.68) and ecological environment risk cognition (0.63). Cooperatives training has a positive moderating effect on the relationship between risk cognition and pesticide overuse behavior, that is, when risk cognition matches farmers participating in cooperatives training, the effect on reducing pesticide overuse is more significant. Years of education, planting scale and detection frequency of pesticide residues have significant effects on farmers' pesticide overuse. CONCLUSIONS: The government should help farmers reduce pesticide overuse by improving risk cognition, developing agricultural cooperatives and perfecting guarantee conditions.