Rural development in the digital age: Does information and communication technology adoption contribute to credit access and income growth in rural China?

Information and communication technology (ICT) plays an important role in rural livelihoods household well-being. Therefore, this study examines the impact of ICT adoption on farmers' decisions to access credit joint effects income using 2016 China Labour-force Dynamics Survey data. Both recursive bivariate probit model a selectivity-corrected ordinary least square regression are employed for analysis. The results show that increases probability by 12.8% empowers women farm households relatively less-developed regions credit. affect differently. significantly income, while reduces it, primarily because farmers do not use acquired invest income-generating off-farm business activities. has largest positive at highest 90th quantile. Our findings suggest improving infrastructure enhance developing ICT-based financial products enable sufficient funds can improve welfare.