• Media type: E-Article
  • Title: Time to Change What to Sow: Risk Preferences and Technology Adoption Decisions of Cotton Farmers in China
  • Contributor: Liu, Elaine M.
  • Published: MIT Press, 2013
  • Published in: The Review of Economics and Statistics, 95 (2013) 4, Seite 1386-1403
  • Language: English
  • DOI: 10.1162/rest_a_00295
  • ISSN: 0034-6535; 1530-9142
  • Origination:
  • Footnote:
  • Description: <jats:title>Abstract</jats:title><jats:p>This paper examines the role of individual risk attitudes in the decision to adopt a new form of agricultural biotechnology in China. I conducted a survey and a field experiment to elicit the risk preferences of Chinese farmers, who faced the decision of whether to adopt genetically modified Bt cotton a decade ago. In my analysis, I expand the measurement of risk preferences beyond expected utility theory to incorporate prospect theory. I find that farmers who are more risk averse or more loss averse adopt Bt cotton later. Farmers who overweight small probabilities adopt Bt cotton earlier.</jats:p>