China is the world’s largest apple producer, and agricultural cooperatives play an important role in promoting sustainable production in its whole life cycle system. However, few studies on cooperatives have evaluated the environmental and economic performance from the life cycle thinking perspective. In this study, the combined methods of life cycle assessment (LCA) and life cycle cost (LCC) were used to comparatively analyze the environmental and economic performance of apple production between cooperatives and smallholder farmers. The results showed that, compared to the smallholder farmers, cooperatives significantly reduced resource depletion and environmental impacts by 12.50–22.16% in each category. The total environmental index for the cooperatives was 7.44% and 22.09% lower than smallholder farmers; meanwhile, the total LCC was 2659.71 Chinese Yuan (CNY), 19.27% lower than smallholder farmers. However, the net profit was 2990.29 CNY for the cooperatives, 21.23% higher than smallholder farmers. The results indicated that cooperatives exhibited a higher net profit while having lower resource input, environmental impact, and LCC than smallholder farmers. Moreover, pesticides and fertilizers were identified as the most critical environmental hotspots. Moreover, human labor cost was the most significant contributor to the total economic cost of the apple production system. These findings provide insights into optimizing farm inputs for apple production and active participation in agricultural cooperatives to alleviate multiple environmental impacts while maintaining apple yield and improving economic benefits, intending to make a marginal contribution to promoting sustainable development of the apple industry in China.

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Farmland environmental pollution has put greater pressure on the sustainability of agricultural production systems. Exploring the relationship between farm size and environmental pollution in agriculture can help provide realistic guidance for stakeholders. In this study, the research data from apple farmers in China were used to measure the environmental pollutant emissions caused by apple production using the life-cycle assessment (LCA) approach. The mediating effect model was used to examine the mechanisms and pathways by which farm size affects the environmental effects of apple production and to identify the mediating effects of fertilizer, pesticide, and machinery input intensity. Finally, a heterogeneity analysis was conducted to illustrate the impact of participation in agricultural cooperatives on the environmental performance of apple production for smallholder farmers. The results showed that the apple production system’s negative environmental impacts from the agricultural material production phase were more significant compared to the farming phase, with a contribution potential of 56.50%. Farm size directly impacts the environmental effects of apple production, and there is a U-shaped trend between the two, implying that from the perspective of environmental effects, larger farm size is not better. There were some mediating effects in the paths of farm size on the environmental effects, and the largest effect was fertilizer input intensity with a full mediating effect; the second largest effect was machinery input intensity with a partial mediating effect, and the mediating effect accounted for 15.50–15.89% of the total effect; the mediating effect of pesticide input intensity was not significant. In addition, the study also found that joining agricultural cooperatives was beneficial in promoting the improvement of the negative environmental impact caused by apple production. These findings provide insights into optimizing farm inputs for apple production and identifying the appropriate farm size to alleviate multiple environmental impacts, intending to make a marginal contribution to promoting sustainable development of the apple industry in China also providing the research evidence for the comparative study of the environmental burdens of apple production in China and other countries in the world.