E-commerce and green food consumption of rural residents: implications for sustainable rural food systems

The findings indicate that e-commerce operations significantly promote green food consumption of rural residents, and this conclusion remains robust after multiple robustness and endogeneity tests. Mechanism analysis reveals that e-commerce facilitates green food consumption by improving household income, enhancing information acquisition, and strengthening logistics infrastructure. Heterogeneity analysis shows that the positive effect is more pronounced among rural residents with higher social capital, in the central and eastern regions, and in major grain-producing areas. Additional results suggest that platform e-commerce, large-scale operations, and businesses involving primary processed products exert stronger effects on green food consumption, while e-commerce operations more effectively boost the consumption of green vegetables and dairy products. Overall, by examining e-commerce operations, this study provides an in-depth analysis of how online market participation fosters green food consumption of rural residents, offering important insights for advancing sustainable consumption in the context of digital economy transformation.