Contract-digital chain integration and income gains: evidence from Chinese crop farmers

This study innovatively constructs a unified analytical framework to examine how coordinated participation in contract and digital chains affects farm income. Using microdata from the 2020 China Rural Revitalization Survey and a Conditional Mixed Process (CMP) model, our results reveal that dual-chain coordination significantly enhances crop farmers’ income, indicating a strong coupling synergy. Although participation in either contract or digital chains independently contributes to income gains, the income effect of coordinated participation not only surpasses that of either single chain but also exceeds the simple sum of their individual impacts. These findings provide novel evidence on the coupling advantage of organizational and digital upgrading in rural China and other developing countries.