Organizational Trust in Farmer Organizations : Evidence from the Chinese Fresh Apple Industry

Purpose: We examine the role and importance of trust in a type of Chinese farmer cooperative organization called “Farm Bases,” considering the extent to which trust affects their performance and how the relationship between trust and Farm Base performance is affected by perceptions of risk and uncertainty and other considerations.Design/approach: We interviewed a random sample of 355 farmers, most of who are from 42 different Farm Bases in China. We operationalized organizational trust by assessing the perception of trustworthiness and competence that farmers have in Farm Base managers. We conducted a regression analysis of the data to answer our research questions.Findings: Our findings support a nuanced role of trust for performance measures of Farm Bases. Trust matters but in limited and specific contexts. Specifically, trust does not correlate with the marketing volume of Chinese FBs and only weakly correlates with FB compliance of production standards.Originality/value: Farm Bases play an essential role in China's agribusiness policies and are pervasive in Chinese business practices. Very little research has been conducted on Chinese Farm Bases and of the role of trust in organizational performance