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Journal of Integrative Agriculture  2026, Vol. 25 Issue (6): 2188-2200    DOI: 10.1016/j.jia.2025.12.066
Section 1: Behavioral Adoption Drivers Advanced Online Publication | Current Issue | Archive | Adv Search |
Farmers’ preferences for agricultural drone services under uncertainty: A choice experiment in Hubei, China

Hua Zhang1, Lena Kuhn1#, Hang Xiong2, 3, Zhanli Sun1#

1 Leibniz Institute of Agricultural Development in Transition Economies (IAMO), Halle (Saale) 06120, Germany

2 College of Economics and Management, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan 430070, China

3 Digital Agriculture Research Institute, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan 430070, China

 Highlights 
Small farmers are willing to adopt agricultural drone services when collective hiring is feasible.
Farmers prefer drone services provided by local suppliers with contracts.
Farmers who are younger, with higher‑education, and have prior adoption experiences are more likely to adopt drone services.
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摘要  无人机在数字农业生产中具有多方面优势,如提高生产效率、节省劳动力并降低环境负担等。然而,小农户对农业无人机的采纳仍相对滞后。现有文献多将其归因于资金约束、土地碎片化或数字素养不足,较少从不确定性视角探讨具体采纳模式的作用机制。本文聚焦农业无人机服务的集体雇佣模式,重点分析服务提供者不确定性对农户采纳决策的影响。基于湖北省338户农户的离散选择实验数据,本文运用混合Logit模型分析农户对农业无人机服务及其属性的偏好。研究发现:第一,绝大多数受访农户愿意采纳农业无人机服务;就具体服务属性而言,农户偏好本地化、有合同保障且价格较低的服务。第二,研究中的高意愿采纳者通常具有以下特征:年轻、受教育程度较高、经营地形条件较差的农地、通过口碑渠道了解无人机以及具有无人机采纳经验。第三,农户愿意支付平均每亩25元的农业无人机服务费,且愿意为本地服务提供者支付比合同保障更高的溢价。上述发现表明,通过服务集体雇佣模式推广农业无人机能够有效提升农户的采纳意愿,为此有必要从供给侧提供激励措施,并通过降低不确定性的推广策略,促进小农户获取和采纳农业无人机服务。

Abstract  

Agricultural drones can improve productivity, save labor, and reduce environmental impacts by offering digital multifunctionality in agricultural production.  Yet, the lagging adoption among smallholders is still prevalent.  Existing literature commonly explains it by the lack of capital, land fragmentation, and digital illiteracy, with little delving into specific adoption modes under uncertainty.  In this study, we demonstrate the potential of hiring agricultural drone services and investigate the role of supplier uncertainty in the adoption decision.  We conduct a discrete choice experiment among 338 farmers in Hubei Province, China.  Mixed logit models are used to analyze farmers’ preferences for the agricultural drone service (ADS) and its attributes.  The results show that the large majority of sampled farmers are willing to adopt ADS.  Besides low prices, farmers prefer services with local suppliers and contracts.  Potential adopters in this choice experiment are characterized by youth, higher education, owning poor-topography farms, drone learning via word-of-mouth, and adoption experience.  The willingness to pay analysis indicates that farmers would like to spend 25 CNY per mu (53 USD per ha) on average for ADS.  Notably, farmers value the localness of suppliers more than the form of agreements when choosing a particular drone service.  These findings suggest that the mode of hiring ADS can effectively motivate farmers’ adoption intention, thereby requiring supply-side incentives and uncertainty-reducing promotion strategies to enhance smallholders’ access to and adoption of agricultural drones.

Keywords:  UAV       digital agriculture       technology adoption       mixed logit model  
Received: 19 December 2024   Accepted: 02 October 2025 Online: 31 December 2025  
Fund: 

This study is funded by the German Ministry of Education and Research (01DO21009), the Major Program of National Social Science Foundation of China (23&ZD116) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (72173050).

About author:  Hua Zhang, E-mail: zhang@iamo.de; #Correspondence Lena Kuhn, E-mail: kuhn@iamo.de; Zhanli Sun, E-mail: sun@iamo.de

Cite this article: 

Hua Zhang, Lena Kuhn, Hang Xiong, Zhanli Sun. 2026. Farmers’ preferences for agricultural drone services under uncertainty: A choice experiment in Hubei, China. Journal of Integrative Agriculture, 25(6): 2188-2200.

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