Grain farmers’ marketing channel choice and its economic implications: evidence on chemical input use, production costs, and sales behaviour

Marketing channel choice plays a crucial role in shaping small-scale grain farmers’ production decisions and sales outcomes, yet empirical evidence remains limited. This study categorizes grain farmers’ marketing channel choices into farmgate (door-to-door), non-farmgate informal, and non-farmgate formal channels. We examine the effects of marketing channel choice on fertilizer expenditure, pesticide expenditure, production costs, and sales frequency. Using a multivalued treatment effects (MVTE) framework with the inverse probability weighted regression adjustment (IPWRA) estimator, we address selection bias and estimate open-access data from the 2020 China Rural Revitalization Survey. Results show that, compared with selling through the farmgate channel, selling through the non-farmgate informal channel is associated with higher sales frequency. Compared with both farmgate and non-farmgate informal channels, selling through the non-farmgate formal channel is associated with lower fertilizer and pesticide expenditures, production costs, and sale frequency. Heterogeneity analysis further shows that these associations are more pronounced among small farms and vary with distance to town. This study offers practical implications for designing market-oriented interventions to strengthen smallholder farmers’ access to formal, organized marketing channels.