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Highlights • Payments of $30 Mg CO 2 −1 preserved 97% of mature forests in our study region. • Payments of $10–15 Mg CO 2 −1 resulted in zero net carbon emissions. • Payments of $15 Mg CO 2 −1 decreased regional agricultural production by −30%. • REDD+ payments increased inequality among farm households in our landscape. • REDD+ might be more successful as a strict climate change mitigation mechanism. Abstract We used a hybrid optimization-agent-based model to simulate REDD+ (Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation in combination with conservation, sustainable forest management, and enhancement of forest carbon stocks) payment scenarios to farm households in the old deforestation frontier of Rondônia, Brazil. Payments varied from $5 to $30 per ton of net CO 2 either not emitted or removed from the atmosphere relative to a baseline scenario. The impacts of REDD+ were assessed as changes in land use/cover, net CO 2 emissions, program costs, community welfare, and agricultural production. Our results suggest that interventions aimed at zero gross deforestation would require unrealistically large annual disbursements. In contrast, zero net carbon emissions can be achieved at approximately two-thirds the cost with reduced impacts on food production. Overall, simulated payments increased inequality among households, which conflicts with desired REDD+ outcomes. Results suggest that REDD+ might be more successful solely as a climate change mitigation mechanism as opposed to a complex multi-objective development program. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Patterns in property values provide strong signals about the future and sustainability of land use. This paper analyzes the determinants of land value in an Amazonian frontier settlement. We estimate hedonic price functions to identify factors that affect the value of farm properties in the western Brazilian Amazon. Distance to market explains nearly one-third of the variation in farm value, as predicted by the von Thünen model. After controlling for location relative to the central market and for municipality, we find that investment in the farms (as reflected in the stocking rate of pastures and the establishment of home gardens) has the next largest impact on land value. The value per hectare of land is negatively related to total lot size, suggesting that any economies of scale are outweighed by the cost of accessing remote corners of large properties. We do not find that land values are related to available measures of biophysical factors or to historic or current land use. Our results do not identify any premium for forest cover or for land uses considered to be more sustainable than pasture on the property itself. However, farm values are affected by neighboring land cover, specifically, the extent of barren land. Thus, local knowledge of factors contributing to future productivity, as summarized in land values, confirms that soil exhaustion can lead to a general decline in property values, while investments in a property both as a homestead and as a farm can help sustain frontier settlements. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Tropical deforestation has typically been characterized as a process with persistent environmental costs (in the form of biodiversity and ecosystem services loss) and short-lived economic benefits (in the form of one-off timber harvests and agricultural fertility boosts). However, this characterization is largely based on agronomic study of tropical soils, and does not fully capture the long-term agricultural potential of cleared land. Landowners can make investments to improve fertility and raise productivity, extending the time horizons over which agriculture is profitable. Whether they choose to make these investments depends on available technologies, the relative prices of inputs and outputs, and the cost of the alternative strategy of clearing additional forest. There is little evidence on how agricultural productivity in the tropics changes over time for individual farmers, because regional development processes confound changes in land productivity when aggregate data are used. Understanding the trajectory of returns to land after tropical deforestation matters because the effectiveness of policies to limit deforestation, promote reforestation, and encourage agricultural intensification all depend on the values of forested and deforested land to farmers and the time horizons over which those values are maintained. This paper estimates the contributions of forested, newly-deforested, and long-deforested land to total property values reported by smallholders in established agrarian settlements in the western Brazilian Amazon. We find—during a decade in which the Brazilian government significantly strengthened its enforcement of forest laws—that deforested land retained its value, the value of forested land increased relative to cleared land, and the value of newly cleared land declined. • We estimate the trajectory of land values after land is converted from forest to agriculture in the Brazilian Amazon. • Deforested land has retained its value over periods of more than 15 years after deforestation. • The relative value of standing forest increased during a period of stronger forest protection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]