Overcoming barriers to agriculture green technology diffusion through stakeholders in China: A social network analysis

It is crucial to actively encourage the development of agriculture green technology, which has been regarded as one of the most effective solutions to the environmental degradation caused by agricultural activities. However, agriculture green technology diffusion is indeed a challenging task and still faces numerous barriers. The stakeholders who can potentially deal with these barriers, however, have been overlooked by previous studies. To address these issues, social network analysis was performed to identify critical stakeholders and barriers. Their interactions in agriculture green technology diffusion were analyzed based on the literature, a questionnaire survey and expert judgments. A two-mode network and two one-mode networks were used to analyze the relationships among the identified 12 barriers and 14 stakeholders who can influence these 12 barriers identified. The results show that agricultural research institutes, universities, agribusiness, agencies of township promotion, the government and farmers’ relatives are key stakeholders and that the limited market demand for green technology and the high cost of its diffusion are two main barriers. However, poor green technology operability and farmer families in distress are factors that are not as important as previously perceived. Finally, some recommendations and suggestions are provided to promote agriculture green technology diffusion in China.