Interaction between joining platform blockchain technology and channel encroachment for fresh agricultural product firms

Abstract In recent years, some e‐commerce platforms (e.g., JD.com), which allow firms to set up third‐party stores on them, have established their own blockchain technology and publicly provided blockchain technology to firms. Besides, source tracing of fresh agricultural products on blockchain is a concern for consumers. For firms selling fresh agricultural products, whether to join the platform blockchain technology to disclose product freshness and whether to set up third‐party stores on platforms are thorny problems. To research the interaction between joining the platform blockchain technology strategy and channel encroachment decision for fresh agricultural product firms, we consider four theoretical models. The main results demonstrate that whether firms set up third‐party stores on the platforms or not, their strategies of joining the platform blockchain technology are dependent on consumer's sensitivity to the freshness‐keeping effort level of fresh agricultural product, consumer's trust degree of freshness‐keeping effort level, and the unit blockchain operation cost. Besides, if firms set up third‐party stores, the willingness of joining the platform blockchain technology will increase. Firms’ channel encroachment willingness will also be affected by their joining the platform blockchain technology strategy. Moreover, when considering the fresh agricultural product supply chain, these main conclusions are still held.