Non-agricultural Employment, Technology Adoption and Natural Rubber Production.

(1) Background--Natural rubber production is obviously different from other crops, rubber trees are a long-term biological asset, and rubber tapping production is a daily activity. The decision of rubber growers mainly focuses on the allocation of labor factors, and the technology adoption is not included in the analysis framework of the impact of non-agricultural employment on rubber tapping production in reviewed literatures. (2) Methods--The research data came from two rounds of questionnaire surveys of rural households in Hainan Province and Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture in Yunnan Province in 2013 and 2019. The least square method, logit model and intermediate effect model were used to discuss the influence transmission of rubber planting scale, non-agricultural employment, technology adoption and rubber tapping production. The least square method and logit model were used to quantitatively analyze the influence of rubber planting scale on non-agricultural employment, and the intermediate effect model was used to identify the effect of low-frequency rubber tapping technology on non-agricultural employment and rubber tapping production. (3) Results--The larger the scale of household rubber planting, the smaller the proportion of non-agricultural employment in the labor force. The increase of years of schooling and the non-agricultural employment of fathers could significantly increase the probability of part-time employment and out-migrating for work of young labor forces. Rubber planting area increased by 1%, and the proportion of household non-agricultural employment labor forces decreased by 0.6 percentage points, and the percentage of young labor forces in non-farm employment fell by 0.5 percent. Compared with the two rounds of survey data, the deterioration of natural rubber market conditions did not change the negative correlation between rubber planting scale and the proportion of mi grant workers, and the estimated coefficients were very close. In fact, the proportion of households with no labor forces out-migrating for work in the 2019 survey samples increased by 0.9 percentage points compared with that in the 2013 survey samples. The local employment market was buoyant, and only about one third of house holds were pure farmers, which was similar to the national situation. The increase of rubber planting area and non-agricultural employment labor forces would make the rubber growers change the production patterns of rubber tapping. Due to the specificity of rubber tree assets and rubber tapping technology, the increase of rubber planting area would inhibit non-agricultural employment, and further promote the rubber growers to maintain normal rubber tapping production. The contribution of low-frequency rubber tapping technology to the reduction of rubber tapping activities caused by the expansion of rubber planting area and the increase of non-agricultural labor forces was very small, less than 3%, indicating that the adaptability of low-frequency rubber tapping technology in private rubber plantations was very low. The main reason was that the low-frequency rubber tapping technology was difficult to master, the risk was large, and the rubber planting scale was small. (4) Conclusions and Discussions--In order to balance rubber tapping production and non-agricultural employment, the following policy recommendations are put forward: First, improve the labor productivity of rubber tapping, including the promotion of low-frequency rubber tapping technology, the development of rubber tapping machinery and equipment, and the promotion and publicity of relevant technologies. Second, strengthen the skills training of rubber growers, increase the effective supply of non-agricultural employment market, and at the same time increase the supply of jobs. Third, construct the trading platform for the rubber plantation and rubber tree resources to promote the scale management of the rubber plantations, pilot professional services for the rubber growers provided by state-owned farms, professional cooperatives, large growers, scientific research institutes and other entities, and establish a service standard system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]