Organic food production among Chinese urban botanists

Abstract Organic food production is recognized by most countries and regions worldwide as a method of ecological and environmental protection because traditional agricultural practices significantly use pesticides and other chemicals, creating severe issues regarding the ecological, environmental, and food safety issues. Most research on organic production focuses on large-scale organic production. This study focuses on growing noncommercial, small-scale urban organic food using the value-belief-norm (VBN) model to explore the pro-environmental behavior regarding organic food production from a psychological perspective. We employed nonprobability sampling because of the absence of a sampling framework for the target population. We obtained a sample of 621 respondents from noncommercial urban botanists in China followed by quantitative methods to examine the relationships among variables using partial least squares structural equation modeling. This study focused on organic food behavior by modifying the VBN theory, which built trust in organic food production methods and developed a structural equation model to explain the underlying motivational factors that influenced the propensity to grow organic food. Finally, the path analysis results demonstrated that all hypothesized associations were statistically significant, except for the ecological worldview on personal norms and trust in organic food production, and personal norms on intention toward organic food production. Overall, the results of this study verify the validity of the VBN theory in the context of organic food consumption as a pro-environmental behavior. Therefore, relevant departments and governments should take measures to promote organic food production in China from a psychological perspective.