The disparity between construction targets and the real needs of farmers in the construction of rural facilities is a problem that has led to a failure in meeting farmers’ demands. This paper investigates farmers’ satisfaction and the influencing factors of rural facilities through factor analysis and logit regression model. This research led to three key findings: (
Rural facilities construction is the foundation to ensure the comprehensive and rapid development of a rural economy and an important content of new rural construction. This construction also serves as the basis of a harmonious rural environment and overall affluence. Addressing problems in the construction of rural facilities is very crucial to the achievement of sustainable and coordinated urban and rural development. In recent years, some issues such as the incomplete supervision mechanism, limited financing channels, and lack of maintenance have become increasingly prominent with the rapid development of rural facilities. The real needs of farmers have been ignored all the time in the “top-down” planning pattern, resulting in a disconnection between construction targets and farmers’ real demands.
With the aim of addressing the aforementioned disconnection, the researchers conducted a study on farmers’ satisfaction of rural facilities and its significant indicators. On the basis of existing studies, the researchers selected evaluation factors of satisfaction assessment to create a comprehensive questionnaire that consists of whole satisfaction, satisfaction of each type of facilities, price attitude, horizontal comparison, vertical comparison, and basic information of interviewees. The reliability of the questionnaire was analyzed to test the validity of the survey. Factor analysis was then conducted to identify 15 factors and weights of indicators to calculate the satisfaction score. Finally, the logit regression model was used to analyze the 15 factors to test their effects on farmers’ satisfaction.
At present, research related to rural facilities focuses mainly on sustainable development, existing problems and policy recommendations, and performance evaluation. Previous research on the sustainable development of infrastructure can be divided into research of evaluation index and the establishment of evaluation model. Many foreign studies related are about the sustainability of the whole life cycle of projects, while domestic Chinese research usually focuses on a certain stage to study the sustainable development of projects. With the deepening of research, the evaluation index system of infrastructure sustainability is constantly improved. Gan et al. [
Performance evaluation mostly focuses on the efficiency of investment and farmers’ satisfaction. Summing up previous studies, the construction of rural infrastructure in China has been continuously improved with government’s continuous investment, which has promoted the development of rural economy and farmers’ economic status and living environment. However, the investment efficiency of rural infrastructure still has to be increased, and farmers’ satisfaction on infrastructure construction is unsatisfactory. There is still great need for improvement in the performance of rural infrastructure construction. Many scholars have studied the investment in rural infrastructure by panel data. Xu and Wang [
Studies related to farmers’ satisfaction have focused mainly on the customer satisfaction model and empirical research. For the research based on customer satisfaction, Li and Zeng [
Problems and policy recommendations in the study showed that the main problems in the construction of rural infrastructure consisting of the “top-down” decision-making mechanism cannot meet the real needs of farmers and have incomplete maintenance, imperfect laws and regulations, unclear division of responsibilities, imperfect supervision mechanism, lack of farmers’ participation, lack of capital, and lack of investors [
Integrating existing research, considerable research has been performed in relation to farmers’ satisfaction and influencing indicators in rural infrastructure. However, no further analysis related to significant indicators exists, such as the reason of their significant impact, influence pattern, measures to improve their performance to help with the improvement of rural infrastructure, and ways to avoid negative effects caused by them. Besides, most existing studies separately focus on farmers’ satisfaction, a certain kind of infrastructure, and the farmers’ satisfaction under horizontal comparison or vertical comparison. No comprehensive consideration of all rural infrastructure satisfaction, horizontal comparison, and vertical comparison of farmers’ satisfaction and farmers’ perception of infrastructure charges and other factors exist. On the other hand, there remains a gap ever since 2010, so that we have no understanding of the current situation and farmers’ actual demands of rural facilities. Thus, to investigate the current status of rural infrastructure in Sichuan, this paper takes these aforementioned factors into account and plans to achieve further analysis for significant indicators. In this paper, factor analysis and logit regression model were used to analyze farmers’ satisfaction and its influencing indicators to know the current situation of rural facilities in Sichuan and prepare for further analysis.
Several methods to study farmers’ satisfaction have been utilized, including analytic hierarchy process, factor analysis, cluster analysis, and CSI. Results calculated by different methods have some differences, but the general trend is basically the same [
Factor analysis is a multivariate statistical analysis method that can convert measured variables to a small number of nonrelated comprehensive factors. These comprehensive factors reflect the main information of original measured variables and explain the relationship between measured variables [
Among them,
The dependent variable is the overall satisfaction of farmers with the rural facilities and is divided into two categories: “satisfaction” and “dissatisfaction.” Statistical methods that can be used to handle categorical dependent variables include discriminant analysis, probit analysis, logit regression model, and log-linear model. Logit regression analysis is an ideal model for analyzing individual decision behavior and is widely used in the analysis of influencing factors. Logit regression analysis is divided into binary logistic regression analysis, where the dependent variables can only be 1 or 0, and multinomial logistic regression analysis, where the dependent variables can take more than two values. In this paper, the dependent variable is divided into two categories, so the binary logistic regression model is adopted. Variables do not have to meet the normal distribution or equal variance in logit model. The probability of occurrence for specimen is
On the basis of existing research, we selected evaluation indices related to several types of facilities and several aspects, such as rural roads, drinking water, sewage treatment, renovation and construction of public toilets, village planning and renovation, electricity and communication signal facilities, renovation of fuel and kitchen, irrigation facilities, healthcare facilities, cultural and entertainment facilities, educational facilities, farmers’ satisfaction, satisfaction compared to that five years ago and neighboring villages, and feeling of fees. At the same time, farmers’ individual characteristics indices, such as gender, age, region, education, family population, family structure, family income, source of income, village type, and distance from the village to county, were also included. Finally, 53 indices were selected. The sources and specific content of the evaluation index are shown in Tables
Index source.
Index | Source |
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Region | [ |
Gender | [ |
Age | [ |
Family top education | [ |
Family size | [ |
Family structure | [ |
Village type | [ |
Annual income | [ |
Source of income | [ |
Distance from village to county | [ |
Road | [ |
Drinking water | [ |
Sewage treatment | [ |
Renovation of public toilets | [ |
Village planning and reconstruction | [ |
Electricity and communication signal | [ |
Renovation of fuel and kitchen | [ |
Irrigation facilities | [ |
Health facility | [ |
Culture and entertainment | [ |
Education facilities | [ |
Infrastructure compared with that 5 years ago | [ |
Infrastructure compared with neighboring villages | [ |
Infrastructure charges | [ |
Total satisfaction | [ |
Farmers’ individual characteristics indices are important parts of the questionnaire. We can understand the regional differences of rural infrastructure construction in Sichuan Province, the economic conditions of farmers, and the views and needs of different ideological level on the construction of rural infrastructure through the study of farmers’ individual characteristics. Rural roads, drinking water, sewage treatment, renovation and construction of public toilets, village planning and renovation, electricity and communication signal facilities, renovation of fuel and kitchen, irrigation facilities, healthcare facilities, cultural and entertainment facilities, and educational facilities are contents of rural infrastructure. The purpose of this study is to fully understand the situation of rural infrastructure construction in Sichuan. Therefore, this study takes into account the above-mentioned infrastructure and aims to understand the construction of various types of rural infrastructure in Sichuan.
This paper is based on the National Natural Science Foundation of China Youth Fund Project “Contribution of Rural Infrastructure Investment and the Degree of Satisfaction of the Government Role Orientation” (71301151), and data were obtained under the organization of home research with the help of students from the Engineering Management Department of Chengdu University of Technology. To ensure the validity and authenticity of the data, and to guarantee that interviewees can understand the questions well, the research group regarded students from rural area as preinterviewers. A meeting was held to investigate students’ opinions of rural infrastructure and guarantee the validity of questionnaires that students were responsible for. A total of 300 questionnaires were issued; 243 valid questionnaires were recovered, with an effective recovery rate of 81%. The questionnaire covers 23 cities in Sichuan Province, encompassing a wide range of regional representation. A total of 106 women and 137 men were interviewed, accounting for 43.6% and 56.4%, respectively. The basic situation of all investigated objects is shown in Table
Basic information of interviewees.
Factor | Proportion |
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Gender | |
Female | 43.6% |
Male | 56.4% |
Family size | |
Less than 4 people | 30.4% |
4 people | 30% |
5 people | 25.8% |
More than 5 people | 13.8% |
Age | |
Less than 20 years | 15% |
From 20 to 30 years | 69.1% |
From 30 to 40 years | 5.2% |
From 40 to 50 years | 8.2% |
From 50 to 60 years | 2.1% |
Over 60 years | 0.4% |
Family top education | |
Primary school | 0.8% |
Junior high school | 7.6% |
High school | 13.9% |
Bachelor’s | 75.6% |
Master’s | 1.7% |
Doctorate | 0.4% |
Annual income | |
Less than 50,000 Yuan | 67.5% |
From 50,000 to 100,000 Yuan | 22.8% |
From 100,000 to 200,000 Yuan | 6.8% |
Over 200,000 Yuan | 2.9% |
The Likert scale was used for the questionnaire analysis (e.g., 1 = very dissatisfied; 3 = dissatisfied; 5 = moderate; 7 = satisfied; and 9 = very satisfied). The definition of variables, except for 5, is established with linear interpolation method. Parts of variables are shown in Table
Variable definition.
Variable | Variable definition |
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Total satisfaction | 0 = dissatisfied, 1 = satisfied |
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Gender | 1 = female, 9 = male |
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Age | 1 = over 60 years, 2.6 = from 50 to 60 years, 4.2 = from 40 to 50 years, 5.8 = from 30 to 40 years, 7.4 = from 20 to 30 years, 9 = less than 20 years |
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Family top education | 1 = primary school, 2.6 = junior high school, 4.2 = high school, 5.8 = Bachelor’s, 7.4 = Master’s, 9 = Doctorate |
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Family size | 1 = more than 5 people, 3.67 = 5 people, 6.33 = 4 people, 9 = less than 4 people |
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Family structure | 1 = ordinary family, 5 = party family, 9 = cadre family |
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Annual income | 1 = less than 50,000 Yuan, 3.67 = from 50,000 to 100,000 Yuan, 6.33 = from 100,000 to 200,000 Yuan, 9 = over 200,000 Yuan |
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Village type | 1 = ordinary village, 3.67 = township resident, 6.33 = combination of urban and rural areas, 9 = both township resident and a combination of urban and rural areas |
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Distance from village to county | 1 = more than 100 km, 2.6 = from 50 to 100 km, 4.2 = from 30 to 50 km, 5.8 = from 20 to 30 km, 7.4 = from 10 to 20 km, 9 = less than 10 km |
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Infrastructure satisfaction | 1 = very dissatisfied, 3 = dissatisfied, 5 = moderate, 7 = satisfied, 9 = very satisfied |
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Infrastructure compared that with 5 years ago | 1 = worse, 3.67 = almost no change, 6.33 = having certain improvement, 9 = much better |
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Village infrastructure compared with neighboring villages | 1 = one of the worst, 3 = worse than medium, 5 = medium, 7 = better than medium, 9 = one of the best |
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Infrastructure charges | 1 = no charge, 2.6 = very cheap, 4.2 = cheap, 5.8 = suitable, 7.4 = expensive, 9 = very expensive |
Rotated component matrix.
Factor | |||||||||||||||
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1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | |
Region ( |
.093 | −.193 | .041 | −.166 | .100 | .040 | .128 | −.078 | .053 | −.228 | .341 | −.174 | −.467 | −.089 | .212 |
Gender ( |
−.041 | −.037 | .001 | −.030 | .039 | −.046 | .063 | .010 | −.049 | −.024 | .035 | −.088 | .045 | .024 | −.844 |
Age ( |
−.150 | −.042 | −.002 | −.104 | .027 | .066 | −.027 | −.082 | −.176 | −.085 | .020 | .185 | .638 | −.053 | −.013 |
Family top education ( |
.069 | −.079 | −.050 | −.067 | .125 | .001 | .104 | .005 | .056 | .027 | .082 | −.055 | .691 | .063 | .039 |
Family size ( |
−.075 | .033 | .044 | .008 | .099 | −.003 | .029 | −.038 | −.047 | .069 | .037 | .094 | −.083 | .715 | .083 |
Family structure ( |
−.031 | −.122 | −.184 | .039 | .039 | .072 | .103 | −.053 | −.056 | .097 | .078 | .375 | .064 | .193 | .444 |
Annual income ( |
.012 | −.035 | .069 | .055 | .173 | −.082 | −.006 | −.021 | .003 | −.030 | .044 | .653 | −.041 | .141 | .005 |
Source of income ( |
.087 | .048 | −.072 | .060 | .015 | .005 | .083 | .063 | −.045 | .001 | .033 | .673 | .184 | −.024 | .135 |
Distance from village to County ( |
.262 | .051 | .032 | −.152 | −.002 | −.011 | −.087 | .057 | .010 | −.129 | −.013 | .079 | .304 | .601 | −.101 |
Road satisfaction ( |
.324 | −.011 | .090 | −.190 | .513 | .090 | .063 | −.062 | .365 | .128 | .012 | .192 | −.040 | .221 | .006 |
Drinking water facilities satisfaction ( |
.120 | −.011 | .893 | .064 | .164 | .052 | .079 | .093 | .047 | .118 | .065 | −.056 | −.023 | .079 | −.047 |
Sewage treatment satisfaction ( |
.179 | .037 | .580 | .007 | −.002 | .605 | .067 | .093 | .087 | .027 | −.132 | .092 | −.037 | −.113 | .039 |
Renovation of public toilets satisfaction ( |
.049 | −.023 | .045 | .135 | .169 | .799 | .241 | .032 | .078 | .096 | .082 | −.072 | .065 | .015 | .146 |
Village planning and reconstruction satisfaction ( |
.196 | .003 | .141 | .092 | .169 | .171 | .137 | .079 | .045 | .865 | .034 | −.004 | −.016 | .013 | .047 |
Electricity and communication signal satisfaction ( |
.095 | −.020 | .114 | .220 | .799 | .165 | .072 | .197 | .028 | .099 | −.132 | .023 | .114 | .002 | .052 |
Renovation of fuel and kitchen satisfaction ( |
.137 | .009 | .088 | .109 | .227 | .070 | .140 | .873 | .159 | .076 | .054 | .038 | −.010 | −.011 | −.036 |
Irrigation facilities satisfaction ( |
.124 | −.013 | .251 | .050 | .108 | .125 | .572 | .275 | .433 | −.058 | −.090 | −.142 | .123 | .216 | .198 |
Health facility satisfaction ( |
.079 | −.013 | .002 | .278 | .157 | .124 | .161 | .069 | .816 | .015 | −.046 | −.037 | −.099 | −.084 | .050 |
Culture and entertainment satisfaction ( |
.157 | .051 | .061 | .152 | .119 | .310 | .758 | .086 | .100 | .171 | .016 | .174 | .015 | −.109 | −.063 |
Education facilities satisfaction ( |
.098 | .015 | .057 | .841 | .056 | .133 | .128 | .077 | .244 | .104 | .037 | .128 | −.057 | −.085 | −.006 |
Road compared with that 5 years ago ( |
.059 | .030 | .182 | −.141 | .621 | −.079 | .073 | .094 | .205 | .285 | .043 | .224 | −.005 | .078 | −.148 |
Drinking water facilities compared with those 5 years ago ( |
.120 | −.011 | .893 | .064 | .164 | .052 | .079 | .093 | .047 | .118 | .065 | −.055 | −.023 | .079 | −.047 |
Sewage treatment compared with that 5 years ago ( |
.208 | .030 | .618 | −.002 | .012 | .594 | .114 | .107 | .096 | .036 | −.067 | .082 | −.038 | −.066 | .002 |
Renovation of public toilets compared with that 5 years ago ( |
.137 | −.032 | .059 | .185 | .184 | .751 | .189 | .009 | .089 | .236 | .167 | −.118 | .052 | .059 | −.035 |
Village planning and reconstruction compared with those 5 years ago ( |
.191 | .003 | .150 | .104 | .209 | .166 | .152 | .093 | .060 | .862 | .047 | −.021 | .017 | −.024 | .035 |
Electricity and communication signal compared with those 5 years ago ( |
.082 | −.012 | .116 | .211 | .812 | .173 | .098 | .233 | .034 | .073 | −.112 | .018 | .119 | .013 | .027 |
Renovation of fuel and kitchen compared with that 5 years ago ( |
.154 | −.003 | .094 | .128 | .222 | .046 | .128 | .882 | .137 | .081 | .083 | .035 | −.017 | −.001 | −.054 |
Irrigation facilities compared with those 5 years ago ( |
.191 | −.033 | .262 | .088 | .106 | .083 | .544 | .279 | .466 | .012 | −.063 | −.164 | .115 | .199 | .109 |
Health facility compared with that 5 years ago ( |
.143 | −.082 | .132 | .392 | .116 | .108 | .125 | .086 | .753 | .115 | −.014 | −.023 | −.094 | −.070 | −.056 |
Culture and entertainment compared with those 5 years ago ( |
.201 | .027 | .031 | .209 | .124 | .249 | .748 | .087 | .112 | .216 | .048 | .181 | .007 | −.106 | −.104 |
Education facilities compared with those 5 years ago ( |
.098 | .015 | .057 | .841 | .056 | .133 | .128 | .077 | .244 | .104 | .037 | .128 | −.057 | −.085 | −.006 |
Road compared with neighboring villages ( |
.532 | .109 | .110 | −.111 | .504 | −.086 | .104 | .120 | .051 | .169 | −.031 | .135 | −.059 | .129 | −.006 |
Drinking water facilities compared with neighboring villages ( |
.536 | −.181 | .412 | .086 | .190 | −.073 | .007 | −.087 | .057 | .071 | .005 | .121 | −.067 | −.101 | .006 |
Sewage treatment compared with neighboring villages ( |
.688 | −.006 | .202 | −.002 | −.098 | .194 | −.001 | .132 | .225 | .104 | .099 | .163 | .017 | −.066 | −.043 |
Renovation of public toilets compared with neighboring villages ( |
.525 | −.019 | −.011 | .214 | −.140 | .485 | .170 | .092 | .103 | .159 | .032 | −.006 | −.046 | .033 | −.031 |
Village planning and reconstruction compared with neighboring villages ( |
.665 | .080 | −.041 | .034 | .169 | .147 | .094 | .168 | .022 | .357 | −.002 | .022 | −.019 | .087 | .078 |
Electricity and communication signal compared with neighboring villages ( |
.625 | .024 | .086 | .211 | .366 | .123 | .057 | .156 | .073 | −.064 | −.001 | .002 | .024 | −.110 | −.031 |
Renovation of fuel and kitchen compared with neighboring villages ( |
.401 | .069 | .096 | −.025 | .032 | .025 | .051 | .532 | −.155 | .064 | −.142 | −.035 | −.057 | −.015 | .052 |
Irrigation facilities compared with neighboring villages ( |
.541 | .112 | .277 | .173 | .020 | −.036 | .313 | .248 | .047 | −.011 | −.083 | −.080 | .138 | .149 | .053 |
Health facility compared with neighboring villages ( |
.489 | .059 | .016 | .451 | .145 | .155 | .256 | .058 | .134 | .045 | −.087 | −.099 | −.056 | .108 | .016 |
Culture and entertainment compared with neighboring villages ( |
.532 | .095 | .125 | .221 | .011 | .146 | .496 | .102 | −.005 | .187 | .054 | −.067 | −.110 | .053 | −.007 |
Education facilities compared with neighboring villages ( |
.522 | −.059 | .073 | .603 | .096 | .045 | .143 | .105 | −.029 | −.038 | .073 | −.094 | −.074 | .087 | .174 |
Bus charge evaluation ( |
−.185 | .637 | −.088 | −.255 | −.006 | .007 | .066 | .108 | −.069 | .079 | −.116 | .098 | −.078 | −.002 | −.095 |
Evaluation of water charge ( |
.130 | .658 | .054 | .159 | −.009 | .165 | −.099 | .072 | .033 | .016 | .107 | −.028 | −.062 | .156 | −.093 |
Evaluation of environmental management fees ( |
.196 | .672 | .051 | .016 | −.131 | .193 | −.103 | −.007 | .136 | .051 | .071 | .048 | .021 | .096 | −.086 |
Evaluation of electricity price ( |
−.131 | .728 | −.089 | .022 | .041 | −.135 | .260 | −.010 | −.150 | −.052 | .013 | .113 | −.076 | .052 | .002 |
Communication charge evaluation ( |
−.052 | .596 | −.111 | .200 | .162 | −.209 | .181 | −.255 | −.233 | −.065 | .173 | −.078 | −.029 | −.008 | −.020 |
Broadband charge evaluation ( |
.097 | .605 | .147 | .088 | .020 | −.202 | −.053 | .017 | −.022 | −.010 | .336 | −.133 | .199 | −.219 | .164 |
Fuel charge evaluation ( |
.149 | .671 | .023 | −.101 | −.014 | .013 | −.093 | .027 | .150 | −.008 | .273 | −.101 | .020 | −.148 | .199 |
Evaluation of medical treatment fee ( |
−.116 | .510 | −.006 | −.106 | .134 | −.168 | .079 | −.017 | −.141 | −.023 | .491 | −.123 | −.002 | .043 | .076 |
Evaluation of cultural and entertainment charges ( |
.064 | .249 | .033 | −.068 | −.135 | .151 | −.019 | .042 | .010 | .034 | .680 | .162 | .070 | −.068 | −.008 |
Evaluation of education fees ( |
−.039 | .245 | .010 | .226 | −.119 | .055 | −.006 | −.001 | −.047 | .081 | .733 | .052 | −.011 | .132 | −.061 |
SPSS software was used to analyze the data. The original data are normalized to eliminate the difference in magnitude and dimension. To ensure validity of the questionnaire, the validity and construct validity of the questionnaire were tested by Cronbach’s coefficient. The coefficient of the questionnaire data was 0.927, indicating that the questionnaire is reliable.
Factor analysis showed that the KMO statistic was 0.775, and the
The distribution of factor indices is shown in Table
Indicators in each factor.
Factor | Index |
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The comprehensive score of each index was obtained based on the analysis of the factor score coefficient table, and the scores of the absolute values are normalized to obtain the weight of each index. According to the results of the questionnaire, the overall evaluation score of rural infrastructure construction satisfaction was 4.84.
The dependent variable of this paper is the total satisfaction of rural households with the infrastructure construction, which is divided into two categories: “satisfaction” and “dissatisfaction.” Logit regression analysis was used to analyze 15 factors. The results of the omnibus test are shown in Table
Omnibus test of model coefficients.
Chi-square | Df. | Sig. | |
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Step 1 | |||
Step | 81.505 | 15 | 0.000 |
Block | 81.505 | 15 | 0.000 |
Model | 81.505 | 15 | 0.000 |
Hosmer and Lemeshow test.
Step | Chi-square | Df. | Sig. |
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1 | 10.818 | 8 | 0.212 |
Model estimation results.
Variable | Parameter | Wald |
---|---|---|
ln ( |
1.073 |
27.497 |
ln ( |
−0.091 | 0.292 |
ln ( |
0.214 | 1.590 |
ln ( |
0.026 | 0.027 |
ln ( |
0.398 |
6.053 |
ln ( |
0.643 |
11.778 |
ln ( |
0.322 |
3.629 |
ln ( |
0.570 |
11.302 |
ln ( |
0.473 |
7.763 |
ln ( |
0.407 |
5.969 |
ln ( |
0.020 | 0.015 |
ln ( |
0.467 |
6.347 |
ln ( |
−0.247 | 2.246 |
ln ( |
0.184 | 1.383 |
ln ( |
0.043 | 0.069 |
Constant | 0.856 |
23.710 |
According to the Wald value in Table
The top three factors that affect farmers’ satisfaction are “horizontal comparison,” “renovation and construction of public toilets,” and “renovation of fuel and kitchen.” The horizontal comparison factor ranks in the first place, which coincides with the research of Fan and Luo [
It is worth noting that Table
Based on Table
According to the above analysis, factors that affect satisfaction of farmers are represented mainly by the rural living infrastructure, confirming the hierarchy and phase of farmers’ demand for rural public services and order of their satisfaction proposed by Tang et al. [
This paper conducted a comprehensive investigation of the situation of rural infrastructure from the perspective of farmers’ satisfaction. Factor analysis and logit regression model were used to analyze farmers’ satisfaction. The overall satisfaction score of farmers in terms of infrastructure was dissatisfied (4.84 points), indicating that the demand for infrastructure of farmers has not been satisfied, and many problems still need to be addressed in the construction of rural infrastructure. Farmers’ satisfaction is affected mainly by the horizontal comparison factor, road facilities, electricity and communication signal facilities, public toilets renovation, irrigation facilities, cultural and entertainment facilities, fuel and kitchen renovation, village planning, medical facilities, and farmers’ income situation. Area, age, family top education, family size, and distance from village to county have certain effects on the satisfaction of the farmers, but the effects are limited. Drinking water facilities, sewage treatment facilities, educational facilities, charges, gender, and family structure have little effect on farmers’ satisfaction.
Farmers’ demand for rural infrastructure is transitioning from production to livelihood. Thus, the government needs to proceed from the actual situation in rural areas and take into account the real needs of farmers to promote the development of rural economy, improve the living standards of farmers, and enable rural infrastructure to truly meet users’ demands.
This paper studies the present situation of the construction of rural infrastructure in Sichuan Province and discusses the construction of various types of rural infrastructure and farmers’ views and needs comprehensively. It lays a foundation for further research on development of rural infrastructure construction and farmers’ demands and provides a theoretical basis for policy makers. Indices in this research are derived from previous studies, most of which are old and are aimed at other provinces. Therefore, these indices cannot reflect the current rural infrastructure situation of Sichuan Province. It is hoped that index could get further adjustment after this round of research, so that a comprehensive index system could be established to evaluate the current situation of rural infrastructure construction in Sichuan Province.
Our next step is a further analysis based on this paper to achieve further studies on significant factors and conduct another investigation based on this survey.
Research methods of this paper are also applicable to other countries to study present situation of the construction and farmers’ satisfaction assessment of rural facilities, but appropriate adjustments should be made accordingly. The construction of rural infrastructure varies from place to place, and the construction effects are different under different national conditions and different construction modes, so the applicability of the conclusions of this study in other countries still needs further discussion.
The authors declare no conflicts of interest.
The authors appreciate the support from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Project nos. 51608060 and 71301151) and the Talent Fund of Chengdu University of Technology (Project no. KYGG201303).