In the quasi-market contract, the company and farmers agree on the rights and obligations of both parties in production, sales, service, benefit distribution and risk sharing through the contract. Its core is to establish a benefit distribution mechanism between enterprises and farmers through contracts and standardize the trading relationship between companies and farmers. The formation of this contractual relationship is actually a game process in which the bargaining position is determined by strength, and all parties in the game include farmers, companies, consumers and regulatory authorities. Among them, industrialized leading enterprises have replaced many enterprises such as seeds, pesticides, purchasing and processing, and undertaken all trading tasks with farmers and consumers.
In the above-mentioned four-party game, the roles and behavioral motives of all parties are as follows: (1) As the operator and beneficiary, the company has a dominant position in contract negotiation and performance, and can pass on the responsibility to farmers when food safety problems occur; (2) Farmers, producers and victims are at a disadvantage in the negotiation, and they assume excessive market risks invisibly. In order to maximize profits, farmers often cut corners in production and provide unqualified agricultural products. Therefore, farmers are not only the "victims" of incomplete contracts, but also the initiators of food safety problems; (3) Because of information asymmetry, consumers who are often deceived cannot find unsafe food. Once there is a food safety accident, the responsibility will be shifted to farmers, and consumers can't find farmers to pursue their responsibilities, and their rights and interests can't be guaranteed. They only admit that they are unlucky, so they continue to connive at companies and farmers to provide inferior products to the market; (4) Government-unqualified regulator and connivance. Due to the high cost of supervision, it is impossible to effectively supervise and manage scattered farmers and companies, and even some local governments and supervision departments have reached a "conspiracy" with companies for their own interests, condoning their violations.
The above operational defects of the quasi-market contract mode of "company plus farmer" have led to the following negative effects: (1) New negative external effects, in which both parties of the contract shirk their responsibilities and cannot fully perform their duties. In order to reduce the cost, the company relaxed the supervision and management of agricultural products quality, which made the quality of raw materials decline; Because farmers no longer face consumers directly, the motivation to seek the market by quality is reduced, which affects food safety from the source; (2) Information asymmetry leads to opportunistic behavior, concealing the real situation from each other and sending wrong signals to the market. The market cannot rely on the supply and demand mechanism to expel unsafe food; (3) Incomplete contracts lead to asymmetry of risks and benefits, and the restraint mechanism fails. Many factors strengthen the default tendency of both parties to the contract.