Community forest management,gender and fuelwood collection in rural Nepal

This paper investigates how Forest User Group (FUG) management of community forests and household characteristics influence household allocation of male and female labor to fuelwood collection in rural Nepal. FUG collection bans are found to displace both landed and landless female fuelwood collection labor to other forests that are typically further away, but lower restrictions do not. A higher female FUG executive committee share has both conservation and equity enhancing effects by lowering the likelihoods that landless, Dalit, landed and non-Dalit women collect in other forests, and increasing the likelihood landless males collect in the FUG forest.     

Effects of industrial plantations on ecosystem services and livelihoods: Perspectives of rural communities in China

This paper addresses the current research void on local community views of changes in ecosystem services associated with rapid land use transformation in the context of plantation-based forestry. This interview-based study, conducted in southern China, aims at assessing the perspectives of local communities of: 1) the effects of Eucalyptus industrial plantations on selected ecosystem services and on local development; and 2) opportunities for future community livelihood development, based on the relations with the government and with forest industry operating locally. We analysed data from semi-structured interviews with 70 villagers for their views on changes in ecosystem services after the establishment of plantations, and their future expectations on the local livelihood development. Most interviewees mentioned some negative development on environmental quality after the establishment of the industrial plantations, especially on soil and water. Furthermore, the reduced productivity of cropland surrounding industrial plantations, coupled with other financial drivers, induced several villagers to switch from agricultural crops to household plantations. In the absence of destructive typhoons, household plantations can provide owners more free time, higher income, while industrial plantations provided some employment opportunities. Interviewees’ expectations for the future included receiving financial support and capacity building for household plantations and crops, support to local roads and schools, and higher employment opportunities. Some interviewees suggested that solutions should be implemented for improving degraded water quality, while others suggested reducing forestry operations. Even though being highly context-specific, our findings open up the discussion about the further community development opportunities in the context of plantation forestry. In particular, the potential of value sharing mechanisms between the private sector and the local communities should be further studied.     

Rural/Urban Welfare Program and Labor Force Participation

Nonmetro poor in the Midwest participate more in the labor force and less in welfare programs than metro poor. We formalize how household composition, capital, labor market conditions, and state-specific regulations define opportunity sets, then estimate a bivariate binomial probit model of work and program participation choices. An Oaxaca decomposition analysis is conducted to compare differences in characteristics to differences in behavior in explaining the two groups' choices. We find no behavioral basis for the difference in labor market participation. And while most of the lower Midwestern nonmetro welfare program participation is due to demographics, some is due to different life-cycle behavior.     

Has China’s new round of collective forest reforms caused an increase in the use of productive forest inputs?

Forestland tenure and financial incentives are the most important policy issue to sustainable forest resource management. The new wave of reform of collective forestland tenure (NRCFT) has been launched since 2003 and the governmental matching reform measures (MRMs) for the NRCFT have been introduced since 2009. The objective of these reforms is to enhance sustainable forest resource management in Chinese collective regions by encouraging rural households’ productive forest inputs. We use a unique dataset of 1778 sample households in 18 counties of nine provinces with six years and employ a fixed effects model with clustered standard errors. Our empirical results indicate that: 1) the NRCFT has increased households’ forestland area of different tenure types, and the effects of the MRMs on rural households’ labor input and production expenditures for forestry purposes are generally positive, especially household used forestland as collateral for a loan and afforestation or reafforestation subsidy and reform of Annual Allowance Cut (AAC) have significantly contributed to increase in the use of productive forest inputs; 2) the NRCFT and the MRMs have different impacts on the use of productive forest inputs for different tenure forests, and these reforms have caused the most significant changes in rural households’ production decision changes for household responsibility forestland; 3) both the NRCFT and the MRMs have significant effects on rural households’ rent-in and rent-out forestland; and 4) forestland fragmentations have caused additional labor and investment inputs for rural households’ forest resource management and protection. And finally, market drivers and household and village characteristics factors also affect households’ decisions for productive inputs for their managing forests.     

山区农村劳动力转移对农地退耕的影响以武陵山区为例

[目的]农地退耕是土地利用变化的重要组成部分,明晰农地退耕的影响因素可以为山区生态恢复提供新的路径。[方法]文章基于武陵山区180份农户调查数据,采用多元线性回归模型分析影响山区农地退耕的因素,重点分析山区农村劳动力转移对农地退耕的影响。[结果](1)研究区劳动力转移现象明显,85%的农户家庭存在不同程度的劳动力转移,劳动力转移比例达到51.61%,户均转移劳动力数量占家庭总人口的29.90%;(2)研究区农户退耕较为普遍,退耕农户占样本农户的55%,户均退耕面积0.31hm2;(3)非农收入和农业劳动力比例对农户的退耕面积产生了显著的正向影响,同时家庭女性劳动力数量、家庭总人数、承包地面积、种植耕地的总块数、两个地区哑变量——万木乡和丁市镇也显著影响了农户的退耕地面积。[结论]山区农村劳动力转移带来的非农收入增加促进了农户的农地退耕,但是劳动力转移带来的农业劳动力供给减少又降低了农户的退耕地面积,最终两者的作用相互抵消,使得农村劳动力转移对农户的退耕地面积产生了不可确定的影响。     

集体林区生态公益林建设对劳动力转移的影响——以浙江省为例

生态公益林作为我国政府强化生态文明建设的重要举措,在保障生态安全方面发挥着重要作用.本文使用浙江省的农户调查数据,使用Heckit模型实证检验了农户生态公益林面积和生态公益林损失性补偿对农户家庭劳动力转移的影响.结果表明:尽管生态公益林面积的增加促进了农户劳动力转移,但是生态公益林补贴与劳动力转移呈现出倒U形关系,即随...     

Land rental markets and labor productivity: Evidence from rural China

This study investigates the impact of the land rental market on labor productivity in rural China. Particular attention is given to farm and nonfarm labor productivity. Using 2012 household‐level data and a multinomial endogenous switching treatment regression technique, we find that rural households renting in farmland increased labor productivity in the farm sector by about 55%, whereas labor productivity in the nonfarm sector decreased by about 6%. We also find that rural households renting out farmland had lower labor productivity in both the farm and nonfarm sectors by 13% and 9%, respectively. More family labor transferred from the farm to the nonfarm sector after renting out land.     

The impact of agricultural and household technologies on women: a conceptual and quantitative analysis in Burkina Faso

Agricultural technologies (new cultivars, inorganic fertilizers, soil-and water-conservation techniques) in Sub-Saharan Africa have been primarily introduced to male farmers by male-dominated extension services on the family plots. These yield-increasing, input-intensive technologies increase the demand for farm labor. So, not only do men obtain most of the direct benefits from the introduction of technology but this labor-intensive technology also increases the demands on women's time for additional labor. This raises the question: Are the combined effects of agricultural technologies beneficial or detrimental to women? We first develop a labor-market model that examines the impact of agricultural and household technologies on labor allocation and income determination within the household. We then discuss the important issue of how household labor-allocation decisions and division of income are made within the family in Sub-Saharan Africa. We use a programming model to estimate the effects of these technologies on household incomes and the income of women. The results indicate that the impact of agricultural technologies depends on the type of decision-making prevailing in the household. In contrast, household technologies increase the welfare of women regardless of the type of decision-making. However, with bargaining behavior, agricultural technologies do benefit women and there is some empirical support for this type of household behavior in Sub-Saharan African households.     

How does land fragmentation affect off‐farm labor supply: panel data evidence from China

This article provides a deeper theoretical understanding of the linkages between land fragmentation and off‐farm labor supply in China, and investigates this relationship empirically in a more direct way than does the existing literature. Drawing upon a rural household panel data set collected in Zhejiang, Hubei, and Yunnan Provinces from 1995 to 2002, we estimate the effects in two steps. First, we estimate the effect of land fragmentation on labor productivity. Second, we estimate the effect of land fragmentation on off‐farm labor supply. The production function results show that land fragmentation indeed leads to lower agricultural labor productivity, implying that land consolidation will make on‐farm work more attractive and thus decrease off‐farm labor supply. However, the effect of land consolidation on off‐farm labor supply is not significant. One likely explanation for this result may be the potentially imperfect labor markets.     

New evidence regarding the effects of contract farming on agricultural labor use

Contractual agreements between smallholder farmers and agribusiness companies have gained in importance in many developing countries. While productivity and income effects of contracting in the small farm sector were analyzed in many previous studies, labor market and employment effects are not yet well understood. This is an important research gap, especially against the background of continued population growth and structural transformation. Here, we investigate the effects of two types of contractual agreements between large international processing companies and smallholder farmers on agricultural labor use, household labor allocation, and hired labor demand in Ghana's palm oil sector. We use cross‐sectional survey data and a willingness‐to‐pay approach to control for unobserved heterogeneity between farmers with and without contracts. We find that agricultural labor intensity is substantially reduced through the contracts, because contracting in Ghana is associated with the adoption of labor‐saving procedures and technologies. Simple marketing contracts lead to reallocation of the saved household labor to off‐farm employment, whereas resource‐providing contracts lead to a stronger reallocation of labor within the farming enterprise. Household labor is more affected by labor savings than hired labor.     

The nexus between gender,collective action for public goods and agriculture: evidence from Malawi

Across the developing world, public goods exert significant impacts on the local rural economy in general and agricultural productivity and welfare outcomes in particular. Economic and social‐cultural heterogeneity have, however, long been documented as detrimental to collective capacity to provide public goods. In particular, women are often underrepresented in local leadership and decision‐making processes, as are young adults and minority ethnic groups. While democratic principles dictate that broad civic engagement by women and other groups could improve the efficiency and effectiveness of local governance and increase public goods provision, the empirical evidence on these hypotheses is scant. This article develops a theoretical model highlighting the complexity of constructing a “fair” schedule of individual contributions, given heterogeneity in costs and benefits that accrue to people depending, for instance, on their gender, age, ethnicity, and education. The model demonstrates that representative leadership and broad participation in community organizations can mitigate the negative impacts of heterogeneity on collective capacity to provide public goods. Nationally representative household survey data from Malawi, combined with geospatial and administrative information, are used to test this hypothesis and to estimate the relationship between collective capacity for public good provision and community median estimates of maize yields and household consumption expenditures per capita. The analysis shows that similarities between the leadership and the general population in terms of gender and age, and active participation by women and young adult in community groups, alleviate the negative effects of heterogeneity and increase collective capacity, which in turn improves agriculture productivity and welfare.     

Productivity and Land Enhancing Technologies in Northern Ethiopia: Health, Public Investments, and Sequential Adoption

The adoption of more efficient farming practices and technologies that enhance agricultural productivity and improve environmental sustainability is instrumental for achieving economic growth, food security, and poverty alleviation in sub-Saharan Africa. Our research examines the interaction between public investments, community health, and adoption of productivity and land enhancing technologies by households in the northern Ethiopian state of Tigray. Agricultural technology adoption decisions are modeled as a sequential process where the timing of choices can matter. We find that time spent sick and opportunity costs of caring for sick family members are significant factors in adoption. Sickness, through its impact on household income and labor allocation decisions for healthcare and other activities, significantly reduces the likelihood of technology adoption. Our findings suggest that agencies working to improve agricultural productivity and land resource conservation should consider not only the financial status of potential adopters, but also their related health situation.     

Wage and employment effects of Malawi's fertilizer subsidy program

This article uses three waves of nationally representative household‐level panel data from Malawi to estimate how a large‐scale fertilizer subsidy program impacts the agricultural labor market, known as ganyu in that country. I find that when looking across the entire population of smallholders, receiving an additional 100 kg of subsidized fertilizer causes the average household to supply about three fewer days of ganyu. The fertilizer subsidy program also has a small positive effect on the probability that a household demands agricultural labor, with the results approaching statistical significance. In addition, a 10 kg increase in the average amount of subsidized fertilizer acquired per household in a community boosts the median agricultural wage rate by 1.4% in that community. The increase in wage rates translates to a US $1.40 per year increase in average household income in the years after Malawi's subsidy program was scaled up, and a US $1.86 per year increase in average household income for those who sold their labor before the subsidy program was scaled up. This finding suggests that households who sell their labor off farm may experience some small spillover benefit from the program in the form of higher agricultural wage rates.     

Land use changes to cash crop plantations: crop types,multilevel determinants and policy implications

Cash crop plantation has recently become an expanding global phenomenon. Characterizing the dynamics of cash crop plantations and the corresponding determinants should provide critical references for land use policy. Using aerial photos and geographic information system, this paper investigated the trends of four types of cash crops (tea, fruit, mulberry and nursery) and their relations to other land use changes within Hangzhou region in subtropical China. Results showed that the total cash crop cultivated surface increased by 541.3 ha from 2004 to 2014. Most of the new tea and fruit plantations were established in places previously used as forest and woodland. Mulberry and nursery mainly expanded by replacing paddy, woodland and forest. By combining household survey, geospatial techniques and multilevel regression, multilevel determinants of cash cropping probability and cash crop expansion were quantified. At the parcel level, tea and fruit plantations inclined to occur on hilly land with gentle slope. Mulberry and nursery plantations were likely to be observed in flat areas with low elevation. Parcels covered by high quality soils and with convenient communications experienced greater cash cropping probability. At the household level, households constituted of female and old-aged labor or with low agricultural labor intensity demonstrated high probability of tea and mulberry plantations. Conversely, households constituted of middle-aged labor or with high agricultural labor intensity tended to grow more fruit and nursery. Besides, wealthier households were prone to establish fruit and nursery plantations but were reluctant to involve in tea and mulberry cropping. At the village level, population density was a significant determinant of cash cropping probability, but was an insignificant determinant of cash crop expansion. Greater occurrence of cash cropping was observed in villages with higher proportion of migrant labor and leasing land. Distance to county road and distance to provincial road were identified as negative determinants. Policy was evidenced to be of significant influence on cash cropping probability and cash crop expansion. We argue that a balance should be achieved between cash cropping promotion and natural resources protection in formulating the local land use policy.     

A country scale analysis revealed effective forest policy affecting forest cover changes in Cambodia

Considerable proportions of the remaining global forest areas are currently harboured in tropical countries. Reducing deforestation in this region is important to help mitigate climate change. Effective forest conservation approach is needed to reduce deforestation and degradation in these countries. Here, we investigated the forest conservation effect of community forests and protected areas using country scale data in Cambodia. In addition to these two forest conservation approaches, we also evaluated the effectiveness of protected forests, which are similar to protected areas but managed by different authorities. We compared deforestation between 2006 and 2016 in areas under the three forest conservation approaches and a non-conserved area by applying the inverse probability of treatment weighting with the propensity score minimizing confounding effects. The results showed that community forest, protected areas, and protected forest significantly decreased deforestation compared with non-conserved forests. Out of the three forest conservation approaches, protected forest was the most effective and community forest was the least effective. We conclude that all of the policies we evaluated are effective for forest conservation but the effectiveness varies depending on the approach. Our findings also suggest that the authority managing the given approach plays an important part in its effectiveness.     

Food versus fuel: examining tradeoffs in the allocation of biomass energy sources to domestic and productive uses in Ethiopia

Rural households in Ethiopia have limited options to meet their domestic energy needs because they lack access to modern fuels and technologies. Domestic use of certain fuel sources, such as cow dung, can hinder agricultural outcomes and productivity. This article explores the tradeoffs between domestic and productive uses of biomass energy sources in the Nile Basin of Ethiopia using a nonseparable farm household model where labor allocation to energy collection and farming are analyzed simultaneously. We estimate a system of five structural equations using three‐stage least squares and find that the use of dung as a domestic fuel source has negative implications for the value of harvested crops, while use of on‐farm fuelwood is associated with increased value of agricultural output. On‐farm production of fuelwood appears to increase the value of crop output and provide labor savings, by making fuelwood collection more convenient for households. Policy interventions to support the expansion of agroforestry and increase access to new energy‐efficient technologies are needed to ensure that agricultural productivity can be both increased and sustained.     

林地经营模式的劳动力投入产出效率比较研究——以辽宁省为例

利用2013年和2014年辽宁省集体林权制度改革监测项目调研的地块级面板数据,研究了不同林地经营模式对农民自投劳动力的投入产出效率的影响。同时,还考查了产权因素、政策因素、地块及农户特征对效率的影响。同时,还利用两阶段方法处理了农户数据普遍存在的内生性问题。结果表明:林地经营薪柴林、用材林、林下经济有助于提高劳动投入产出效率,而林地经营农作物会降低劳动投入产出效率。因此,建议进一步明晰产权、促进林下经济的发展、加大林资补贴、促进要素投入的合理配置,以期提高农户经营林地积极性和劳动力生产效率。     

Animal Welfare and Eggs – Cheap Talk or Money on the Counter?

Our estimate revealed willingness to pay for animal welfare using a panel mixed logit model. We utilise a unique household level panel, combining real purchases with survey data on perceived public and private good attributes of different types of eggs. We estimate willingness to pay for organic eggs controlling for trust in a positive connection between the public good animal welfare and the organic label and the private good food safety also connected to the label. Our results suggest that in the real world, animal welfare plays a minor role in the demand for agricultural products.     

森林碳汇价值与农户林业收入增长的分析

根据福建省顺昌县农户林业收入的调查数据,从林产品收入、林业服务性收入、林地地租收入、生态公益林补偿收入、其他涉林收入等方面对农户林业收入构成进行分析,发现森林生态效益在农户林业收入中的贡献非常小,仅占0.18%;以现有碳汇市场为参考,通过森林蓄积量换算因子法估算出该县的森林碳汇量及其碳汇价值,指出森林碳汇价值的实现可以有效地增加农户林业生态收入、改善农户的林业收入结构;并探讨了农户森林碳汇价值实现的途径。