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There will probably be nine billion people on the earth by 2050, meaning food consumption will rise dramatically. Pakistan, the fifth most populous nation in the world, is rapidly expanding its population, making it difficult for the nation to sustain its food supply. Unfortunately, the country's focus on ensuring food security has not kept up with the demographic shifts in its population. However, innovative solutions are sorely needed in the face of several worldwide problems, especially in the crucial agriculture sector. This underscores the need to integrate sustainable financial practices. Considering these circumstances, this research thoroughly examines the intricate relationship inside Pakistan between financial stability (FS), agricultural subsidies, and productivity. Acknowledging the underlying intricacies and asymmetries at work, this study aims to analyze the complex relationships influencing the nation's agricultural production.

The research tries to shed light on the subtle processes at the intersection of financial stability, agricultural subsidies, and agricultural productivity through a comprehensive investigation of these multiple challenges. A non-linear autoregressive distributive lag (NARDL) technique is used, using a dataset from 1980 to 2022.

The results show that FS has a mixed impact on agricultural productivity, both positive and negative. Increasing FS_POS has a beneficial influence on agricultural output, linked to a notable 1.404% increase in output. On the other hand, increasing FS_NEG causes a significant 11.441% decrease in agricultural output, demonstrating its negative impact on output. Subsidies for agriculture also have asymmetric impacts; SUB_POS and SUB_NEG influence variations in agricultural productivity. A substantial 2.414% rise in agricultural output is shown by SUB_POS, demonstrating its noteworthy beneficial influence. Conversely, SUB_NEG adds a relatively small increase of 1.659% in agricultural output. However, the different amounts of each person's contribution show how subtle their effects are.

The current study is limited to the relationship between financial stability, agricultural subsidies, and agricultural productivity, considering the inherent complexity and asymmetries at work in Pakistan only. Further studies are required in Asian markets to have a bigger picture of the agricultural sector.

Considering these critical empirical findings, the report recommends strategic strategies to promote long-term agricultural growth in Pakistan. These include providing integrated financial services customized to farmers' needs, such as credit, insurance, and savings alternatives. Transparency and efficiency in procedural frameworks and the formation of efficient public-private partnerships should be prioritized. Furthermore, improving agricultural subsidy schemes emerges as a crucial priority. Targeting marginalized farmers more effectively and optimizing distribution through transparent, digitally driven systems can significantly improve program performance.

The agriculture sector is crucial for all economies, especially the developing ones. However, agricultural production is influenced by government intervention, which outshines the significant role of good governance indicators in agricultural productivity. In addition to this, the major climate changes also posed various challenges and led to water shortages and yield losses. Thus affecting agricultural production. In this paper, we address the issue by determining the association between state governance and agricultural productivity in N-11 countries.

Panel data have been collected from 2000 to 2021 through the Governance Indicator, World Development Indicator and World Bank databases. For data analysis, the researcher has utilized the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) estimations.

Through ARDL estimations, it is suggested that corruption (CC), employment in agriculture (EAG), political stability and violence absence (PS), rule of law (RL), regulatory equality (RQ) and water quality (WQ) significantly impact agricultural productivity (AGP) in the long run. In the short run, the impact of RL on AGP has been significant.

This study follows the method of data collection from secondary sources, which hinders the effectiveness of this study as, on the basis of the respective data, the potential of the researcher to get specific answers to research questions has been affected. Also, this study examines the context of N-11 countries from 2000 to 2021, which exerts a geographical limitation. While exploring the association between state governance and agricultural productivity, this study neglects the internal aspects of implementing state policies in firms.

On practical grounds, the significant association demonstrated by this study encourages agricultural firms to keenly consider state policies to gain sustainable agricultural development. Moreover, this study encourages agricultural firms to efficiently follow governance policies for efficient productivity. The outcomes of the study have shown that agricultural employment and governance infrastructure can efficiently enhance agricultural productivity. Besides, as per the results, water quality also positively impacts agricultural productivity; thus, relevant steps can be taken by the agricultural sector to improve the quality of water.

This study investigates the impact of board funds, banking credit, and economic development on food production in the context of South Asian economies (India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Nepal).

This study used data from the World Development Indicators covering the years 1991–2019. To investigate the relationship between the variables of the study, we employed the panel unit root test, panel cointegration test, cross-sectional dependence test, fully modified least squares (FMOLS), and panel dynamic least squares (DOLS) estimators.

The empirical results indicate that board funding significantly increase food production; however, banking credit had a negative impact. Furthermore, the findings indicate that economic development, Arable land, fertilizer consumption, and agricultural employment play a leading role in enhancing food production. The results of the Dumitrescu-Hurlin causality test also show substantiated the significance of the causal relationship among all variables.

South Asian countries should prioritize board funding, bank credit, and economic development in their long-term strategies. Ensuring financial access for farmers through micro-credit and public bank initiatives can spur agricultural productivity and economic growth.

This study is the first to combine board funding, banking credit, and economic development to better comprehend their potential impact on food production. Instead of using traditional approaches, this study focuses on these financial and developmental aspects as critical determinants for increasing food production, using evidence from South Asia.

This paper aimed to examine the impacts of agricultural services on welfare of rural farmers in Ghana.

Using data from 1431 rural maize farmers, we employ multinomial endogenous switching regression and multivalued inverse probability weighted regression adjustment to assess the impacts.

Results show that 19.8%, 9.7% and 3.42% of farmers adopted solely irrigation, extension and mechanization, respectively. Furthermore, utilizing a range of agricultural services significantly improves maize yields, gross income and per capita food consumption.

This study recommends strategies that target the adoption of combinations of agricultural services to enhance rural farmers’ welfare in Ghana and other developing countries.

While agricultural services are claimed to improve agricultural production and peasants’ welfare, their impacts are not studied exhaustively. This paper contributes by providing empirical evidence of the impacts of agricultural services on farmers’ welfare.

The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-11-2022-0745.

This study aims to find how trade development and digitalization affect smart-green production. Four factors are investigated in these effects (certification, technology innovation, natural resource management, low pesticides).

The mix-method approach was employed from validating the measurement scale to test the proposed hypotheses. At first, the grounded theory is the most authoritative and standard research method in qualitative research. Secondly, quantitative analysis was employed to draw conclusions about the impact of digitalization and trade development on smart-green agricultural production.

The results found that digitalization and trade development impact the development of smart-green agricultural production through certification employment, technology innovation, and a decrease in pesticide usage. Moreover, digitalization and trade development also indirectly affect the development of intelligent green agricultural production. Meanwhile, digitalization has a higher impact than trade development.

This research is based on the premise that digitalization and trade development can drive smart green agricultural production. Still, some studies have found a deviation between trade development and environmental protection. Hence, future research can explore the incentive effect of trade development and digitalization on other industries. Second, the measurement of the dependent variables in this study is based on the premise that smart-green agricultural production has not been widely promoted, so the changes in production before and after the whole public participation in smart-green output have yet to be reflected.

Smart green production in agriculture is essential for a transition economy and the world to meet food security and protect the environment. However, the effects of certification, technology innovation, natural resource management, and low pesticides on smart-green agriculture production have yet to be identified. Insights from this study can help governments, policy-makers, and farmers in emerging economies by adapting their strategies within their local contexts.

The aim of this study is to discern the role of digital finance in driving rural industrial integration and revitalization. Specifically, it intends to shed light on how the deep development of digital finance can contribute to the optimization and transformation of the rural industrial structure. The research further explores the particular effects of this financial transformation in the central and western regions of China.

This research studies the influence of digital finance on rural industrial integration across 30 Chinese provinces from 2011 to 2020. Utilizing the entropy weight method, a comprehensive evaluation index system is established to gauge the level of rural industrial integration. A two-way fixed effects model, intermediary effect model, and threshold effect model are employed to decipher the relationship between digital finance and rural industrial integration.

Findings reveal a positive relationship between digital finance and rural industrial integration. A single threshold feature was identified: beyond a traditional finance development level, the marginal effect of digital finance on rural industrial integration increases. These effects are more noticeable in central and western regions.

Empirical outcomes contribute to policy discourse on rural digital finance, assisting policymakers in crafting effective strategies. Understanding the threshold of traditional finance development provides a new perspective on the potential of digital finance to drive rural industrial integration.

Financial inclusion and digital finance go side by side and help enhance agricultural activities; however, the magnitude of digital financial services varies across countries. In line with this argument, this study aims to examine whether financial inclusion enhances agricultural participation and decompose the significance of the difference in determinants of agricultural participation between financially included – not financially included households and digital finance – no digital finance households.

This study uses Pakistan’s household integrated economic survey 2018/19 to test hypotheses. The logit model is used to examine the effect of financial inclusion on agriculture participation. Moreover, this study employs a nonlinear Fairlie Oaxaca Blinder technique to investigate the difference in determinants of agricultural participation.

This study reports that financial inclusion positively influences agricultural participation, meaning households may have access to financial services and participate in agricultural activities. The results suggest that the likelihood of participating in agriculture in households with mobiles and smartphones is higher. Moreover, household size, income, age, gender, education, urban, remittances from abroad, fertilizer, pesticides, wheat, cotton, sugarcane, fruits and vegetables are the significant determinants of agricultural participation. To distinguish the financially included – not financially included households’ gap, this study employs a nonlinear Fairlie Oaxaca Blinder decomposition and finds that differences in fertilizer explain the substantial gap in agricultural participation. Likewise, this study tests the digital finance – no digital finance gap and finds that the difference in fertilizer is a significant contributor, describing a considerable gap in agricultural participation.

Empirically identified that various factors cause agricultural participation including financial inclusion and digital finance. Regarding the research limitation, this study only considers a developing country to analyze the findings. However, for future research, scholars may consider some other countries to compare the results and identify their differences.

The accessibility of fertilizer can reduce the agricultural participation gap. However, increased income level, education and cotton and sugar production can also overcome the differences in agriculture participation between digital finance and no digital finance households.

This is the first study to decompose the difference in determinants of agricultural participation between financially and not financially included households.

This study aims to examine the impact of financial inclusion and bank stability on agricultural productivity in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA).

The study used 38 countries in the SSA with data spanning between 2004 and 2021. The data were analyzed using the two-step system generalized method of moments (GMM) and the panel-corrected standard error (PCSE) model.

The study found a positive effect of financial inclusion and bank stability on agricultural productivity. The study also discovered that while the access component of financial inclusion has a negative influence on agricultural productivity, the usage dimension has a positive impact.

The study suggests to policymakers that an inclusive and stable financial system improves agricultural productivity. The findings recommend that policymakers should empower farmers to leverage financial inclusion.

This study provides insightful discussion on the impact of financial inclusion and its various dimensions and bank stability on agricultural productivity in SSA.

The purpose of this study is to explore the effect and mechanism of the digital economy’s influence on the binary margin of agricultural exports.

Based on the theoretical analysis of the mechanism of the digital economy’s influence on the binary margin of agricultural exports, this study empirically examines the effect and mechanism of the digital economy’s influence on the binary margin of agricultural exports based on China’s customs export data from 2011 to 2016.

The relevant findings are threefold. (1) The digital economy significantly improves the binary margin of agricultural exports, and its effect on the intensive margin is stronger than that on the expansive margin. After the expansive margin is subdivided, the effects on the three sub-variables of the expansive margin are in the following order: old products exported to new markets > new products exported to old markets > new products exported to new markets. (2) The heterogeneity analysis reveals that the digital economy has a stronger role in promoting the binary margin of exports for enterprises in the eastern region, high-income countries as the destination of exports and state-owned enterprises. (3) Mechanism analysis shows that the digital economy promotes the binary margin of agricultural exports by reducing trade costs and intensifying market competition.

First, in terms of research perspective, although there are some studies on the impact of the digital economy on export trade in existing literature, the research objects mainly focus on manufacturing enterprises. In fact, agricultural trade is susceptible to natural conditions and seasonal factors, and countries may impose more SPS measures and TBT measures on agricultural trade due to risk considerations. The relationship between the digital economy and agricultural trade also has its own characteristics, but there are few research studies in this area. At present, only Liu and Gao (2022), based on the data of total imports and exports of different agricultural products from 2004 to 2018, have established a vector auto-regressive model to empirically analyse the heterogeneous dynamic impact of the digital economy on the trade volume of agricultural products. In addition, Ma and Guo (2023) conducted an empirical test on the total effect, regional heterogeneity and threshold effect of the digital economy on agricultural export trade based on China’s provincial panel data from 2011 to 2020. Therefore, under the new circumstances of continuous integration of digital technology and agriculture, this study interprets the impact effect and mechanism of the digital economy on the binary margin of agricultural exports from the perspective of the digital economy, providing new research perspectives and approaches for promoting the growth of agricultural exports. Second, in terms of theoretical analysis, the above studies have not been fully analysed in terms of the specific mechanism of the impact of the digital economy on agricultural exports. Based on the positive and negative characteristics of agricultural trade, this study introduces two kinds of roles into the theoretical analysis framework to comprehensively determine the trade impact effect of the digital economy. Third, in terms of research design, this study empirically examines the impact of the digital economy on the binary margin of agricultural products, passing a series of robustness tests and investigating the mediating roles of trade cost and market competition effects, producing an empirical basis for China to leverage the digital economy to promote the binary margin of agricultural exports.

China's agricultural sector has developed very rapidly in the past 30 years and agricultural technological progress is deemed one of the most substantial factors leading to its rapid agricultural GDP growth. The purpose of this paper is to assess the impacts of China's agricultural technological changes on its regional disparity.

The study uses a computable general equilibrium (CGE) model of multiple regions and multiple sectors to investigate the impacts of agricultural technological changes on regional disparity. The CGE model structure includes production side, demand side, and market clearing conditions.

The results suggest that agricultural technological changes significantly reduced China's agricultural regional disparity and accounted for 40 percent reduction in agricultural regional disparity in terms of agricultural GDP per capita. Agricultural technological changes, however, led to an increase in China's overall regional disparity and accounted for 6 percent increase in its overall regional disparity in terms of per capita GDP.

China's GDP has been growing very rapidly since 1978 and agricultural GDP has been playing a decreasing role in China's overall GDP. Regional disparity in non‐agricultural GDP per capita overweighted the equalization of agricultural GDP per capita. The results imply that the Chinese government should resort more to non‐agricultural development to fight against the enlarging regional disparity.

China's agricultural technological changes have led to an increase in China's overall regional disparity while the changes have significantly reduced China's agricultural regional disparity.