Assessing the Impact of Social Media on Crop Farmers' Income: Evidence from Punjab, Pakistan

Amir Hamza¹Yonghong Dai^1*Ihsan Ullah²Nawab Khan³

• ¹1. School of Media and Communication, Yuehai Campus, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen 518060, China, Shenzhen, China
• ²2. School of International Studies, Collaborative Innovation Center for Security and Development of Western Frontier China, Sichuan University, Chengdu 610065, China, Chengdu, China
• ³College of Economics and Management, Shandong Agricultural University, Tai’an, China

Increasing farmers' income and ensuring food security remain significant challenges in Pakistan's agricultural sector. Social media adoption offers new opportunities for knowledgesharing, market access, and productivity gains; however, its impact on agricultural income remains underexplored. This study investigates the impact of social media usage during the production stage on crop farmers' income in Punjab, Pakistan, and explores the underlying mechanisms, including improvements in technical efficiency, land productivity, and labor productivity. Using survey data from 480 crop farmers, an endogenous switching regression model estimates the causal effect of social media usage on agricultural income. Mediation analysis examines how productivity improvements drive income growth. Social media usage significantly increases agricultural income, with results remaining robust across alternative estimation methods. The income gains are largely driven by increases in technical efficiency, land productivity, and are more pronounced among farmers with higher education, larger landholdings, and greater initial income. These findings underscore the transformative role of social media in rural development by facilitating better access to information and improved farm performance. To amplify these benefits, policymakers should prioritize expanding digital infrastructure, promoting digital literacy, and improving access to agricultural information, especially for smallholder and low-income farmers.