The Association Between Climate Change Perception and Agricultural Insurance Adoption Among Food Legume Farmers: A Case Study from Baicheng City in Jilin Province of China

Like other agricultural products, food legumes production faces uncertainty risks stemming from climate change, which may affect yields and consequently impact farmers’ livelihoods. Agricultural insurance serves as one of the climate change adaptation measures available to farmers, helping mitigate the impacts of climate change on agricultural production and livelihoods. While considerable attention has been paid to climate change adaptation through production-side measures, comparatively fewer micro level studies examine insurance adoption as an adaptive response, particularly among food legume farmers. Based on a survey of 460 food legume farmers in Baicheng City, Jilin Province of China, this study employs a binary probit regression model to analyze the relationship between climate change perceptions and farmers’ adoption of agricultural insurance as an adaptation measure. Farmers’ climate change perception is measured through four indicators: perceived changes in average annual temperature, precipitation, drought severity, and frost severity over the past five years. Robustness tests are conducted by using a replacement econometric model, altering the climate change perception variable, and implementing sample restriction. Results indicate that food legume farmers’ perceptions of climate change exhibits significant correlation with their agricultural insurance purchasing behavior. Farmers who perceive lower temperatures and more severe frosts are more inclined to purchase agricultural insurance. Participation in food legume production cooperatives and prior experience with yield reductions exert significant positive correlation with insurance purchase decisions. Therefore, enhancing targeted outreach and education, leveraging the role of cooperatives in insurance promotion, and implementing differentiated insurance promotion based on disaster experiences hold positive implications for reducing farmers’ exposure to climate change risks. The findings further offer valuable insights into climate adaptation policy in other drought-prone, legume-growing regions.