IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jagris/v12y2022i9p1468-d914647.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Does the Adoption of Digital Payment Improve the Financial Availability of Farmer Households? Evidence from China

Author

Listed:
  • Baozhen Chen

    (School of Management, Beijing Union University, Beijing 100101, China)

  • Jinzheng Ren

    (College of Economics and Management, China Agricultural University, Beijing 100083, China)

Abstract

Digital finance carries the expectation of achieving inclusiveness. The purpose of this paper is to explore how digital finance can improve the financial availability and the extent to which digital finance can improve the financial availability of farmer households. Based on micro-rural survey data in China from 2017 to 2019, employing the Cov-AHP weighting method, this study measured the index of financial availability (IFA) of farmer households in terms of three dimensions: investment, bank loans, and private finance. We analyzed the mechanism of how digital payment adoption affects the IFA of farmer households based on the Long Tail Effect theory of Anderson. Ordinary least squares method and ordered probit model was constructed to empirically test the impact of payment adoption on the IFA of farmer households. The research results show that (1) the IFA of Chinese rural households is still at a low level; (2) while the availability of investment is very low, the availability of bank loans is relatively high; and (3) the adoption of digital payment has a positive impact on improving the IFA of farmer households, including the availability of investments, bank loans, and private finance. The results are robust to model misspecification and reverse causality. The evidence also suggests that the adoption of digital payment mainly affects the financial availability of farmer households through information effects. Therefore, attention should be paid to broadening information channels and promoting the adoption of digital payments to improve financial access for farmer households. This study contributes to the comprehensive understanding of the financial situation of households by constructing a financial availability indicator system from three dimensions. By analyzing the impact of digital payment adoption on farmers’ financial availability, this study helps to understand how digital finance can play a positive role in farmer households’ financial conditions.

Suggested Citation

  • Baozhen Chen & Jinzheng Ren, 2022. "Does the Adoption of Digital Payment Improve the Financial Availability of Farmer Households? Evidence from China," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 12(9), pages 1-20, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jagris:v:12:y:2022:i:9:p:1468-:d:914647
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0472/12/9/1468/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0472/12/9/1468/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Allen, Franklin & Demirguc-Kunt, Asli & Klapper, Leora & Martinez Peria, Maria Soledad, 2016. "The foundations of financial inclusion: Understanding ownership and use of formal accounts," Journal of Financial Intermediation, Elsevier, vol. 27(C), pages 1-30.
    2. Maren Duvendack & Philip Mader, 2020. "Impact Of Financial Inclusion In Low‐ And Middle‐Income Countries: A Systematic Review Of Reviews," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 34(3), pages 594-629, July.
    3. Peterson K. Ozili, 2018. "Impact of digital finance on financial inclusion and stability," Borsa Istanbul Review, Research and Business Development Department, Borsa Istanbul, vol. 18(4), pages 329-340, December.
    4. Hoff, Karla & Stiglitz, Joseph E., 1998. "Moneylenders and bankers: price-increasing subsidies in a monopolistically competitive market," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(2), pages 485-518, April.
    5. Ross Levine, 1997. "Financial Development and Economic Growth: Views and Agenda," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 35(2), pages 688-726, June.
    6. Barnett, William A. & Hu, Mingzhi & Wang, Xue, 2019. "Does the utilization of information communication technology promote entrepreneurship: Evidence from rural China," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 141(C), pages 12-21.
    7. Sawadogo, Relwendé & Semedo, Gervasio, 2021. "Financial inclusion, income inequality, and institutions in sub-Saharan Africa: Identifying cross-country inequality regimes," International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 167(C), pages 15-28.
    8. Levine, Ross, 2005. "Finance and Growth: Theory and Evidence," Handbook of Economic Growth, in: Philippe Aghion & Steven Durlauf (ed.), Handbook of Economic Growth, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 12, pages 865-934, Elsevier.
    9. Song, Quanyun & Li, Jie & Wu, Yu & Yin, Zhichao, 2020. "Accessibility of financial services and household consumption in China: Evidence from micro data," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 53(C).
    10. Michael Lokshin & Zurab Sajaia, 2004. "Maximum likelihood estimation of endogenous switching regression models," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 4(3), pages 282-289, September.
    11. Mandira Sarma, 2008. "Index of Financial Inclusion," Working Papers id:1575, eSocialSciences.
    12. Beck, Thorsten & Levine, Ross & Loayza, Norman, 2000. "Finance and the sources of growth," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 58(1-2), pages 261-300.
    13. Jing He & Qinghai Li, 2020. "Can online social interaction improve the digital finance participation of rural households?," China Agricultural Economic Review, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 12(2), pages 295-313, April.
    14. Angelo Frascarelli & Simone Del Sarto & Giada Mastandrea, 2021. "A New Tool for Covering Risk in Agriculture: The Revenue Insurance Policy," Risks, MDPI, vol. 9(7), pages 1-16, July.
    15. Ozili, Peterson Kitakogelu, 2018. "Impact of Digital Finance on Financial Inclusion and Stability," MPRA Paper 84771, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    16. Mandira Sarma, 2008. "Index of Financial Inclusion," Finance Working Papers 22259, East Asian Bureau of Economic Research.
    17. Li, Jie & Wu, Yu & Xiao, Jing Jian, 2020. "The impact of digital finance on household consumption: Evidence from China," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 317-326.
    18. Stiglitz, Joseph E & Weiss, Andrew, 1981. "Credit Rationing in Markets with Imperfect Information," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 71(3), pages 393-410, June.
    19. Mr. Kangni R Kpodar & Mihasonirina Andrianaivo, 2011. "ICT, Financial Inclusion, and Growth: Evidence from African Countries," IMF Working Papers 2011/073, International Monetary Fund.
    20. Park, Albert & Brandt, Loren & Giles, John, 2003. "Competition under credit rationing: theory and evidence from rural China," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(2), pages 463-495, August.
    21. Aziz, Abdul & Naima, Umma, 2021. "Rethinking Digital Financial Inclusion: Evidence from Bangladesh," SocArXiv 7sr5c, Center for Open Science.
    22. Mookerjee, Rajen & Kalipioni, Paul, 2010. "Availability of financial services and income inequality: The evidence from many countries," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 11(4), pages 404-408, December.
    23. Claessens, Stijn & Perotti, Enrico, 2007. "Finance and inequality: Channels and evidence," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 35(4), pages 748-773, December.
    24. Kangni Kpodar & Mihasonirina Andrianaivo, 2011. "ICT, Financial Inclusion and Growth: Evidence from African Countries," Post-Print halshs-00602411, HAL.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Xuanming Ji & Kun Wang & He Xu & Muchen Li, 2021. "Has Digital Financial Inclusion Narrowed the Urban-Rural Income Gap: The Role of Entrepreneurship in China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(15), pages 1-18, July.
    2. Guo‐Hua Cao & Jing Zhang, 2022. "The entrepreneurial ecosystem of inclusive finance and entrepreneurship: A theoretical and empirical test in China," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 27(1), pages 1547-1568, January.
    3. Kazeem B. Ajide & Olorunfemi Y. Alimi & Simplice A. Asongu & Ibrahim D. Raheem, 2022. "The role of institutional infrastructures in financial inclusion‐growth relations: Evidence from SSA," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 27(1), pages 175-191, January.
    4. Nkambule, Maxwell Banele, 2022. "The financial inclusion status of rural households in Eswatini," Research Theses 334766, Collaborative Masters Program in Agricultural and Applied Economics.
    5. Pradhan, Rudra P. & Arvin, Mak B. & Nair, Mahendhiran S. & Hall, John H. & Bennett, Sara E., 2021. "Sustainable economic development in India: The dynamics between financial inclusion, ICT development, and economic growth," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 169(C).
    6. Guillermo Boitano & Deybi Franco Abanto, 2020. "Challenges of financial inclusion policies in Peru," Revista Finanzas y Politica Economica, Universidad Católica de Colombia, vol. 12(1), pages 89-117, June.
    7. Hewa Wellalage, Nirosha & Hunjra, Ahmed Imran & Manita, Riadh & Locke, Stuart M., 2021. "Information communication technology and financial inclusion of innovative entrepreneurs," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 163(C).
    8. Amit Pandey & Ravi Kiran & Rakesh Kumar Sharma, 2023. "Investigating the Determinants of Financial Inclusion in BRICS Economies: Panel Data Analysis Using Fixed-Effect and Cross-Section Random Effect," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(2), pages 1-21, January.
    9. Muri Wole Adedokun & Mehmet Ağa, 2023. "Financial inclusion: A pathway to economic growth in Sub‐Saharan African economies," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 28(3), pages 2712-2728, July.
    10. Amit Pandey & Ravi Kiran & Rakesh Kumar Sharma, 2022. "Investigating the Impact of Financial Inclusion Drivers, Financial Literacy and Financial Initiatives in Fostering Sustainable Growth in North India," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(17), pages 1-21, September.
    11. Shreya Pal & Indranil Bandyopadhyay, 2022. "Impact of financial inclusion on economic growth, financial development, financial efficiency, financial stability, and profitability: an international evidence," SN Business & Economics, Springer, vol. 2(9), pages 1-29, September.
    12. Peterson K. Ozili, 2021. "Financial inclusion research around the world: A review," Forum for Social Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 50(4), pages 457-479, October.
    13. Christian Lambert Nguena, 2019. "Working Paper 323- Mobile Financial and Banking Services Development in Africa," Working Paper Series 2449, African Development Bank.
    14. Ahmad Hassan Ahmad & Christopher Green & Fei Jiang, 2020. "Mobile Money, Financial Inclusion And Development: A Review With Reference To African Experience," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 34(4), pages 753-792, September.
    15. Qiutong Xue & Sixian Feng & Kairan Chen & Muchen Li, 2022. "Impact of Digital Finance on Regional Carbon Emissions: An Empirical Study of Sustainable Development in China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(14), pages 1-26, July.
    16. Josephat Lotto, 2022. "Understanding financial inclusion in East Africa: How does Tanzania compare?," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 27(1), pages 1075-1084, January.
    17. Agyekum, Francis K. & Reddy, Krishna & Wallace, Damien & Wellalage, Nirosha H., 2022. "Does technological inclusion promote financial inclusion among SMEs? Evidence from South-East Asian (SEA) countries," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 53(C).
    18. Murshed, Muntasir & Ahmed, Rizwan & Al-Tal, Raad Mahmoud & Kumpamool, Chamaiporn & Vetchagool, Witchulada & Avarado, Rafael, 2023. "Determinants of financial inclusion in South Asia: The moderating and mediating roles of internal conflict settlement," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    19. Ozili, Peterson K, 2021. "Measuring financial inclusion and financial exclusion," MPRA Paper 107866, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    20. Minli Yu & Fu-Sheng Tsai & Hui Jin & Hejie Zhang, 2022. "Digital finance and renewable energy consumption: evidence from China," Financial Innovation, Springer;Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, vol. 8(1), pages 1-19, December.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jagris:v:12:y:2022:i:9:p:1468-:d:914647. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.