How sustainable is participatory watershed development in India?

Watershed conservation is widely recognized as a major strategy for rural development throughout the developing world. In India, the apparent success of participatory approaches to watershed development resulted in a decentralization of project planning, implementation, and management to local communities at the village scale. We explore the effectiveness of this so‐called community‐based approach in achieving sustainable soil and water conservation in four semi‐arid regions in India, and analyze what factors explain project success. We confirm the result of earlier studies that participatory approaches are more effective in establishing soil and water conservation in the short run. However, our main result is that investments in community organization fail to ensure household commitment to maintenance in the longer term. Without better returns to investment in soil and water conservation and without local institutions to coordinate investment in the long run, the sustainability of participatory watershed management is seriously threatened.     

When collective action and tenure allocations collide: Outcomes from community forests in Quintana Roo,Mexico and Petén,Guatemala

Based on a comparative case study of four community forestry enterprises in Guatemala and Mexico, we examine the relationship between user group characteristics and state allocation of tenure bundles. Using Schlager and Ostrom's four levels of tenure bundles and collective action theory, we illustrate how tenure bundles and collective action costs interact to either promote or create disincentives for conservation and communal economic benefits. We suggest that in communities with high costs for collective action, a tenure bundle that includes management, withdrawal and exclusion rights yet omits alienation rights may be optimal for community forestry. We also demonstrate how unclear allocation of rights can result in local interpretations of land rights that do support collective action.     

How do producer organisations enhance farmers’ empowerment in the context of fair trade certification?

ABSTRACT

In the fair trade (FT) coffee sector, collective dynamics are viewed as a prerequisite for empowerment. The question of whether and how collective organisations empower farmers in the context of FT has yet to be fully explored. Using the concepts of collective agency and empowerment, this paper analyses the case of four farmers’ groups involved in two FT certified producer organisations in Peru. The results show that collective dynamics are drivers of change in this context oand help provide a ‘power to’ change coffee-related activities. They also generate a sense of ‘power with’, which improves group visibility and capacity to build new partnerships. Farmers gain the opportunity to develop their livelihood activities and women farmers develop ‘power from within’. TDespite that, collective action still focuses primarily on coffee and members-only projects. Inclusive rural development depends on extending ‘power with’ to other agricultural domains and to networks in the social and economic spheres.     

推进生态产品价值创造的流域综合治理项目管理模式优化研究——以深莞茅洲河流域水环境治理项目为例

在全国大力发展生态文明背景下,生态产品价值对流域综合治理项目效益提出了更高的要求。生态产品价值创造视角下流域综合治理项目更加关注生态、经济、社会效益的统一,而传统的流域综合治理项目在推进生态产品价值创造的过程中仍然存在如协同治理的缺失、源头治理的忽视、施工效率的低下等诸多问题,严重影响了生态产品价值挖掘的充分性与高效性。文章基于系统均衡理论,以中国电力建设股份有限公司所开展的深莞茅洲河流域水环境治理项目为例,总结流域综合治理项目管理模式经验,并提出科学顶层设计、完善实施路径、创新项目实施模式三个维度的优化措施,助力流域提高生态产品供给量,实现人和自然和谐共生的流域综合治理目标。以生态产品价值创造的视角研究流域综合治理项目效益,进一步深化了流域综合治理理论的发展,为全国流域综合治理提供可参考的经验。     

Sustainability assessment methodology of urban mobility projects

In Brazil, the introduction of a national urban mobility policy occurred only in 2012. In this context, the federal government has provided hundreds of millions in investment to improve mobility conditions in urban areas. The main financial institution responsible for analyzing and monitoring developments of this nature considers the following criteria for project assessment: cost, environmental licensing, compatibility, and functionality. However, a project’s contribution to sustainable urban mobility is not taken into account. Thus, the work reported herein aimed to develop a method to assess the sustainability of urban mobility projects. This involved indicator selection, and the development of a tool based on sustainability indicators for project assessment. In addition, an Urban Mobility Project Sustainability Index (UMPSI) was proposed to summarize the assessment, which was tested in five urban mobility projects funded in the Curitiba Metropolitan Region (RMC), presented in a companion paper. Environmental, social, and economic aspects of project design and implementation are considered in the assessment. The proposed method consists of 17 sustainability indicators, grouped according to their connection with environmental, social, and economic aspects. Addition of the proposed method to the contracting and monitoring processes of future urban mobility projects supports the sustainable development of the urban landscape.     

Territorialising REDD+: Conflicts over market-based forest conservation in Lindi,Tanzania

In this paper we use the lens of political ecology to shed light on the causes and effects of pro-poor REDD+ induced land use conflicts. We build our study on recent theoretical work on territorialisation in nature conservation to analyse the conflicts and outcomes of the TFCG/Mjumita REDD+ project in Lindi, Tanzania. Drawing on qualitative fieldwork in two case study villages we argue that conservation organisations increasingly make use of participatory tools, FPIC procedures and good governance principles to include local populations in the creation of what we call market-based conservation territories (MBCT). In contrast to project developer’s claims of win–win benefits, we highlight the mixed outcomes of MBCTs and argue that their performance-driven nature and reliance on formal governance arrangements lead to the enclosure of common forests. This inevitably causes conflicts between and within villages over the meaning, ownership and access to forest resources, especially given the importance of customary relations in tropical rural contexts. We argue that despite the extensive community engagement strategy and genuine pro-poor approach of the REDD+ project, project proponents were unable to prevent land use conflicts and risks of economic and physical displacement. The specific social, economic and political conditions shaped the implementation of the project which led to negative consequences to some stakeholders despite genuinely noble intentions. Therefore, we argue that in order to achieve more positive results when creating MBCT, project developers must better acknowledge the inherent trade-offs of markets in conservation and take the limitations and realities of local governance context better into account. We suggest a more explicit assessment of social and environmental justice in the project and more context-specific efforts to prevent social harm from conservation. Theoretically, our study contributes to a better understanding of territorialisation processes under the current trend of market-based conservation.     

Farmers’ perception of effective drought policy implementation: A case study of 2009–2010 drought in Yunnan province,China

Using a qualitative social research method at the local administrative level, this paper provides insight into the policy process in China and farmers’ perceptions of the effectiveness of policies implemented to deal with drought. Two villages in rural South-West Yunnan were purposefully selected for the study. The research started with the general assumption that China has a strong top-down hierarchal approach to policy processes and that funding dispersal is prioritised by the central government. However, the study found that funding proposals are prioritised for selection in a bottom-up, participatory manner from the local level. The study also found that farmers’ perceptions of the effectiveness of policy implementation were directly related to their past experience. Among the nine indicators used to measure the effectiveness of policy implementation at the local level, the farmers in the study area perceived access to roads as highly effective; water use efficiency projects, market demand, human mobility for jobs, and government funds as moderately effective; drought knowledge, community participation in planning, and governance structures as least effective; and the role of leadership as not effective. The study found that farmers’ adaptation at the local level is oriented towards short-term market rewards and income diversification. Farmers’ local-level adaptation is guided by government priorities and driven by their perception of tangible benefits. To ensure the effectiveness of policy implementation, long-term adaptation strategies, such as awareness raising, capacity building, watershed management, and source conservation need to be strengthened at the local level.     

What role for cooperation in conservation tenders? Paying farmer groups in the High Andes

This paper sheds light on the potential of group-level tenders to enhance conservation where it depends on cooperation of small-scale farmers. We analyze data from two pilot payment for ecosystem service (PES) schemes focused on the conservation of agricultural biodiversity in the Bolivian and Peruvian Andes. Contracts were assigned to farming groups who could choose between different types of in-kind payments with varying degrees of divisibility between group members. Our main results indicate that: (1) stronger general patterns of collective action are positively related to the level of cooperation in group-bid making; (2) where collective action is robust, collective payments seem to provide stronger conservation incentives than individual payments; (3) collective payments could mitigate some potential rent-seeking behavior; (4) selecting bid offers based on both a ‘cooperation’ criterion and conservation land area offered does not overly compromise the cost-effectiveness of PES; and (5) group-level contracts may create strong incentives for contract compliance. Hence, combining farmer group-level contracts with collective in-kind payments can enhance the cost-effectiveness of conservation tenders, while generating co-benefits in terms of increased interaction and social capital among group members.     

Collective action in implementing top-down land policy: The case of Chengdu,China

Rapid urbanization in China has led to the increasing scarcity of land suitable and available for construction. Concurrently, rural depopulation has resulted in many vacant properties, including farmhouses and buildings. In order to address this issue, a national land transfer policy has been implemented since the early 2000s in which vacant rural properties are returned to agriculture in return for similar areas of peri-urban land being released for construction. While there have been many different approaches to policy implementation, most commentators agree that successful schemes are characterized by the involvement of local people. As yet, however, there has been little research into how such local collective action is organized, and whether it is really possible to address top-down policies through local, bottom-up, action. Based on a case study of the earliest pilot program in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, we seek to demonstrate that the top-down nature of China’s land transfer policy does not mean that it is necessarily best implemented in a top-down manner. Indeed, we suggest that effective collective action is crucial to the realization of such policies. In particular, the case study indicates that with the empowerment of villagers to participate in the policy process it is possible to achieve a broad consensus on the best approach to addressing the problems, with community interests protected and properly monitoring. In offering a new way of understanding collective action, we conclude that even in cases where a top-down approach is imposed, communities can be empowered to act collectively in implementing the policy from the bottom-up.     

The Role of Guanxi in Rural Social Movements: Two Case Studies from Taiwan

This paper examines everyday interactions, and particularly the role of traditional ritual and relationships, in the mobilization of rural social movements in Taiwan. In Chinese society, ‘guanxi’ (interpersonal relationships) are involved in everyday social interactions. Studies of collective action, such as social movements, cannot ignore the role that ‘guanxi’ play. This paper argues that collective action in Taiwan is strongly influenced by social practices, such as ‘guanxi’. The early part of the paper discusses social movement theories of social network, and briefly reviews ‘guanxi’ theory and its relationship with the concept of ‘social capital’. The later part examines the function of ‘guanxi’ in two recent social movements: the anti–No. 6/8 Naphtha Cracking Project (A6/8NCP) movement at Taixi and the anti–leather factory movement at Gouzao. These two social movements provide excellent case studies for rethinking how collective action functions in Taiwan.     

公私合作农地整理项目的博弈分析：一个分析框架

在界定公私合作农地整理项目模式的基础上,采用博弈分析法,分析公私合作农地整理项目参与主体的行为目标,探究公私合作农地整理项目中的政府与企业、企业与农村集体组织、企业与农户的博弈关系。研究结果表明,公私合作农地整理项目参与主体的行为目标存在差异;协调政府追求社会福利最大化与企业追求利润最大化的目标冲突可提高项目效率;协调企业与农村集体组织对促进合作有正向影响;农户参与对提高农户项目的满意度有显著意义;政府单一财政投资存在低效率现象,企业单独投资可能导致社会福利损失,政府和企业合作有利于提高农地整理项目的投资效率;政府和企业的合作均衡受各自保留效用的影响,企业与农村集体组织合作投资的初始投入成本对合作具有正向作用;超额收益分配是否合理,影响企业与农村集体组织双方的策略选择,而初始投入成本和违约赔偿金额对农户与企业的合作关系有正向影响。     

小农户的集体行动逻辑

"大国小农"是中国的基本国情农情,对我国农村集体行动进而乡村治理的成败具有决定性影响。本文以我国小农户的特征为切入点,利用制度分析与发展框架,剖析小农户参与农村集体行动的逻辑,揭示我国小农户的特征和对农村集体行动的作用机理,并在此基础上展望未来我国小农户参与农村集体行动的趋势。总体而言,小农户的诸多特征不利于我国农村集体行动的开展,尤其是自20世纪80年代家庭联产承包责任制确立以来,人均资源禀赋不足、耕地细碎化严重、农户持续分化等小农户特征,是导致我国农村集体行动衰败的重要原因。长远来看,土地流转、农业生产经营方式创新和农户收入提高等因素将有助于扭转我国农村集体行动的衰败,为乡村振兴战略的实施提供新的契机。     

Social capital and collective identity in the local food movement

Social movement actors are seeking alternatives to the highly industrialized, global food system through alternative agri-food initiatives to counter the conventional practices of the industrial food system. Many of these initiatives have proven successful. Social movement researchers have documented the importance of the roles and services social movement organizations provide for movement constituents to realize their success, emphasizing human and financial capital as key components for mobilizing collective action. Researchers have also documented the value of interorganizational networks, and the benefits of collaboration to expand the share of resources, and perhaps more importantly design social movement frames to direct collective action for social change. However, what local food movement research has yet to address are some of the potential barriers that minimize collaboration among organizational leaders as it relates to social capital and collective identity. This paper takes a cross-sectional network analysis of social movement organizations working to increase the sustainability of various areas within the local food system in Marin County, California, a historically agricultural region serving a number of urban communities. Findings from the mixed-methods research reveal evidence of collective identity and social capital as enhancing collaboration among particular types of organizations while reducing potential collaboration among and between other social movement organizations. By analysing the collective identity and dichotomous nature of social capital among social movement organizations, this research contributes a clearer understanding of the existing gaps for increasing the sustainability of a local food system.     

‘Because of poverty,we had to come together’: collective action for improved food security in rural Kenya and Uganda

Agricultural productivity in East African smallholder systems is notoriously low and food production faces multiple challenges, including soil degradation, decreasing land availability, poor market integration, disease burdens and climate change impacts. However, recent evidence from an in-depth study from two sites in Kenya and Uganda shows signs of new social dynamics as a response to these multiple stressors. This paper focuses on the emergence of local social institutions for collective action, in which particularly women farmers organize themselves. Although previous research on collective action has largely focused on common-pool resource management, we argue that collective action is one potential pathway to livelihood and sustainability improvements also in a setting of private land ownership. Trust building, awareness raising and actions to improve livelihood security through risk sharing and pooling of labour and other limited assets have given people more time and resources available for diversification, preventative activities, experimentation and resource conservation. It thereby strengthens farmers’ capacity to cope with and adapt to change, as well as contributes to the agency at the local level.     

Learning through practice? Learning from the REDD+ demonstration project,Kalimantan Forests and Climate Partnership (KFCP) in Indonesia

Despite a growing recognition of the importance of social learning in governing and managing land use, the understanding and practice of learning has received limited attention from researchers. In global environmental programs and projects aimed at supporting sustainable land use in developing countries, learning is often promoted but without explicit learning goals. The focus may be on capacity building and community participation, and on testing policy tools, rather than on collaborative social learning. In this study, we looked behind the rhetoric of learning in the Kalimantan Forests and Climate Partnership (KFCP), a large demonstration project for Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) in Indonesia. The novelty of such mechanisms, linked to international forest carbon outcomes, means that learning lessons provides a rationale for REDD+ pilot activities. We used a qualitative approach to examine the nature and type of learning that occurred in the KFCP. While the stated project aims were to support policy experimentation and apply learning, the project design was highly technical, and project decision-making did not explicitly encourage joint problem solving. Despite the project’s shortcomings, we identified that learning did occur by the end of the project in ways that were different to the initial goals. Our findings suggest that flexibility and openness in project design and implementation can enable different local actors to define shared learning agendas in ways that are meaningful for them. Designing and implementing environmental projects, and learning goals within them, should attend to the needs and aspirations of those who will have to live with their long-term consequences. Learning should be integrated into international environmental programs and projects at all levels, including for policy and funding bodies, rather than focusing on local capacity building and similar project ‘benefits’. Interviewees’ eagerness to learn suggests that building approaches to social learning into program design has the potential to yield opportunities for learning beyond REDD+ to other forms of policy experimentation and governance innovations.     

发起人特征、信用背书与偏远贫困地区农产品众筹扶贫项目的融资绩效

信任与有效监督是农产品众筹融资得以成功的基石。发起人与支持者之间的物理距离以及与此相关的直接监督是影响众筹扶贫项目融资绩效的重要因素。本文选取四个代表性的偏远贫困地区农产品众筹扶贫项目为案例,运用逐项复制与差别复制的多案例研究方法,探讨偏远贫困地区农产品众筹扶贫项目融资绩效的实现机制与关键影响因素。研究发现:第一,因其公共组织身份特征并处于利益中立位置,作为发起人的扶贫干部发挥了信用背书功能,增强了支持者的信任感;第二,在驻村机制下,扶贫干部有条件对生产者行为实施直接监督,发挥代理监督功能,且为维护组织及自身的声誉,监督会更加强化,增强了支持者的认可度,缓解了因交易半径扩大导致的信息不对称及支持者参与程度低等问题;第三,发起人利用其公共组织身份的在线社会关系资源,发挥"弱连接"机制下网络社群的异质性优势,在不同层级扩散项目信息、扩大受众边界,进而提高了农产品众筹扶贫项目融资绩效。     

Public preferences for biodiversity conservation and climate-change mitigation: A choice experiment using ecosystem services indicators

Potential conflicts exist between biodiversity conservation and climate-change mitigation as trade-offs in multiple-use land management. This study aims to evaluate public preferences for biodiversity conservation and climate-change mitigation policy considering respondents’ uncertainty on their choice. We conducted a choice experiment using land-use scenarios in the rural Kushiro watershed in northern Japan. The results showed that the public strongly wish to avoid the extinction of endangered species in preference to climate-change mitigation in the form of carbon sequestration by increasing the area of managed forest. Knowledge of the site and the respondents’ awareness of the personal benefits associated with supporting and regulating services had a positive effect on their preference for conservation plans. Thus, decision-makers should be careful about how they provide ecological information for informed choices concerning ecosystem services tradeoffs. Suggesting targets with explicit indicators will affect public preferences, as well as the willingness of the public to pay for such measures. Furthermore, the elicited-choice probabilities approach is useful for revealing the distribution of relative preferences for incomplete scenarios, thus verifying the effectiveness of indicators introduced in the experiment.     

Forest conservation programs and the landowners who prefer them: Profiling family forest owners in the New York City watershed

Voluntary forest conservation programs offer family forest owners (FFO) financial incentives in exchange for legally-binding land use restrictions and/or management obligations. Protecting family forests in the Catskill Mountains region of New York is an important policy objective, as these watersheds provide clean drinking water to New York City. Multiple methods were used to elicit preferences for forest conservation program attributes and to identify potential barriers to participation. Respondents to a mailed survey were grouped according to the program attribute that most influenced their likely participation into forest conservation programs. Respondents were identified as time-sensitive, payment value-sensitive, rights-sensitive, payment mode-sensitive, or harvest-sensitive. Comparing groups revealed significant differences in age, attitudes towards harvesting trees, income, and importance of timber production. Supplemental qualitative data was collected during three focus groups of survey respondents and analyzed for general themes. Focus group discussions revealed a lack of knowledge about conservation easement programs, reluctance to burden landowners’ children with encumbered land inheritances, concerns for resale values and tax assessment, and a simmering animosity towards New York City’s watershed management efforts. We offer strategies to address these concerns and to design programs that will foster greater participation among FFOs in the region.     

Collective action in China’s recent collective forestry property rights reform

China’s recent collective forestry property rights reform (CFPRR) is regarded as the third Land Reform and has been implemented to accelerate China’s rural restructuring. In departing from previous top-down policy changes, the CFPRR has focused on local collective practices and actions. It indicates a shift in China’s rural governance, away from direct intervention towards support for local collective actions. Based on a case study of Hongtian Village, the origin of the CFPRR, this article analyses the process of insinuating collective action and the impact that this has had in creating a new cultural understanding and acceptance of collective forestry property rights. In contrast to the relative insecurity of tenure that can accompany many reforms of the governance of common pool resources, the paper suggests that the success of the ‘Hongtian model’ mainly lies in high levels of process engagement by local people and effective interaction between villagers and the government. While not addressing all the issues associated with the inefficiency of the previous collective approach to forestry, the paper suggests that there are many transferable lessons to be learnt from the CFPRR, both within and beyond China.     

Technology Support for Small-scale Industry in Developing Countries: A Review of Concepts and Project Practices

The paper is a review of approaches towards institutional technology support for small-scale manufacturing enterprises in developing countries since the early 1970s. Early programmes tended to suffer from a number of weaknesses, stemming from a limited conceptualization of technology and an inadequate understanding of the role of the small-scale sector in industrial development more broadly. There was also a lack of practical experience with project implementation. However, in recent years important advances have been made on all these fronts. Four features of recent technology assistance programmes that have tended to be associated with success are discussed, and illustrated with evidence from different projects. Broadly, successful projects: (a) embrace the notion that durable competitiveness of small producers in a competitive economic environment requires that they develop internal capabilities to effectively assimilate, use and adapt product and process technologies; (b) are demand-driven; (c) target the assistance to groups of producers with common interests and problems, and help them to organize themselves in collective bodies that can evolve into self-help institutions; and (d) include appropriate incentive structures based on market principles.