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International audience; We develop a model of optimal land allocation in a developing economy that features three possible land uses: agriculture, primary and secondary forests. The distinction between those forest types reflects their different contributions in terms of public goods. In our model, reforestation is costly because it undermines land title security. Using the forest transition concept, we study long-term land-use change and explain important features of cumulative deforestation across countries. Our results shed light on the speed at which net deforestation ends, on the effect of tenure costs in this process, and on composition in steady state. We also present a policy analysis that emphasizes the critical role of institutional reforms addressing the costs of both deforestation and tenure in order to promote a transition. We find that focusing only on net forest losses can be misleading since late transitions may yield, upon given conditions, a higher level of environmental benefits.; Nous développons un modèle d'allocation optimale des terres dans une économie en développement qui présente trois utilisations possibles des terres : agriculture, forêts primaires et secondaires. La distinction entre ces types de forêts reflète leurs différentes contributions en termes de biens publics. Dans notre modèle, la reforestation est coûteuse car elle porte atteinte à la sécurité des titres fonciers. En utilisant le concept de transition forestière, nous étudions les changements d'utilisation des terres à long terme et expliquons les caractéristiques importantes de la déforestation cumulative entre les pays. Nos résultats mettent en lumière la vitesse à laquelle la déforestation nette prend fin, l'effet des coûts de tenure dans ce processus et la composition en régime permanent. Nous présentons également une analyse politique qui souligne le rôle essentiel des réformes institutionnelles portant sur les coûts de la déforestation et de la tenure afin de promouvoir une transition. Nous constatons que se concentrer uniquement sur les pertes forestières nettes peut être trompeur, car les transitions tardives peuvent produire, dans certaines conditions, un niveau plus élevé de bénéfices environnementaux.

Certification is intended to improve management of and environmental outcomes in developing country forests. Yet we know little about whether and how it actually generates such benefits. To address that question, we analyze 1,162 corrective action requests (CARs) issued after third-party inspections of a diverse set of 35 forests in Mexico certified by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC). CARs detail the changes in procedures and on-the-ground conditions that forest managers must make to either obtain or retain certification. Our analysis indicates that a relatively small proportion of CARs required major changes in on-the-ground environmental conditions. The majority focused on social and legal issues, and the vast majority called for only minor procedural changes. In general, forest managers complied with CARs expeditiously, and the number of CARs they received declined over time. We hypothesize that these findings were at least partly driven by the tendency of FSC certification to attract already-sustainably managed forests and by the governance challenges of community forestry in developing countries. One implication is that policymakers using FSC certification to generate environmental benefits may want to target forests with less-than-stellar management — particularly in the case of reduced emissions from deforestation and degradation (REDD) initiatives that emphasize improvement beyond business-as-usual — and to build the community and legal institutions needed for sustainable forestry.

A conservation good, such as the rainforest, is a hostage: it is possessed by S who may prefer to consume it, but B receives a larger value from continued conservation. A range of prices would make trade mutually beneficial. So, why doesn't B purchase conservation, or the forest, from S? If this were an equilibrium, S would never consume, anticipating a higher price at the next stage. Anticipating this, B prefers to deviate and not pay. The Markov-perfect equilibria are in mixed strategies, implying that the good is consumed (or the forest is cut) at a positive rate. If conservation is more valuable, it is less likely to occur. If there are several interested buyers, cutting increases. If S sets the price and players are patient, the forest disappears with probability one. A rental market has similar properties. By comparison, a rental market dominates a sale market if the value of conservation is low, the consumption value high, and if remote protection is costly. Thus, the theory can explain why optimal conservation does not always occur and why conservation abroad is rented, while domestic conservation is bought.

The aim of this paper is to demonstrate the relationship between land inequality and deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon. Therefore, it is developed an occupational choice model where an individual decides whether to become a farmer in an already established place or to move in search of economic opportunities and land to clear at the agricultural frontier. This model provides theoretical predictions that are tested empirically. Based on data from 515 municipalities, this paper estimates a Tobit model in order to test the theoretical predictions. Basically, it has been shown that there is little statistical evidence to support the existence of a direct relationship between land inequality and deforestation. Nevertheless, when one takes into account the effects of land inequality on deforestation through its interaction with credit and land reform policies, it can be shown that the pattern of land distribution, indeed, plays a role for deforestation. There is a positive relationship between credit and deforestation in more unequal places. Furthermore, this paper provides evidence that land reform in more unequal municipalities reduces deforestation. Hence, it is clear that there is a role for government to increase social welfare and reduce deforestation rates.

This article investigates forest policies and institutions surrounding REDD+ in three heavily forested countries: India, Tanzania, and Mexico. The comparative analysis leads to three key insights. First, each of the case study countries has multiple land tenure statutes that result in different distributions of the costs and benefits of forest protection for key stakeholders. Second, land tenure regimes that offer local communities the most secure forest rights are not necessarily those associated with benefit-sharing mechanisms outlined in national REDD+ policy proposals. Third, a credible commitment by government to share REDD+ benefits with forest-dependent people is contingent on the interests of key actors involved in the policy process. Political and administrative structures that limit the power and authority of forest government bodies lead to more responsive and accountable policy outcomes.

Whether and how to intervene in nature to maintain or restore values is a contested issue among scholars within ecological restoration, protected area management and environmental ethics, but also among the practitioners and public officials who shape how nature is actually managed. This article analyses how the issue of intervention is debated in the case of protected forest area management in Sweden, a country with a traditionally strong preservationist discourse centred on maintaining areas as ‘untouched’ as possible. The analysis shows how this traditional view is challenged by a more interventionist discourse centred on adaptive management for biodiversity, but also how there are still attempts to reaffirm a preservationist discourse and practice. The implications of this as-yet-unsettled debate are discussed, concluding by pointing to a need to examine critically not only the older preservationist discourse and ‘naturalness’, but also the ascendant interventionist discourse and ‘biodiversity’.

We conduct a social dilemma experiment in which real-world leaders can punish group members as a third party. Despite facing an identical environment, leaders are found to take remarkably different punishment approaches. The different leader types revealed experimentally explain the relative success of groups in managing their forest commons. Leaders who emphasize equality and efficiency see positive forest outcomes. Antisocial leaders, who punish indiscriminately, see relatively negative forest outcomes. Our results highlight the importance of leaders in collective action, and more generally the idiosyncratic but powerful roles that leaders may play, leading to substantial variation in group cooperation outcomes. (JEL C93, D03, O13, Q23)

This study was carried out as a part of the POLFOREX project (“Forest as a public good. Evaluation of social and environmental benefits of forests in Poland to improve management efficiency”; PL0257) funded by EEA Financial Mechanism, Norwegian Financial Mechanism and Polish Ministry of Science and Higher Education. Funding support is gratefully acknowledged. The paper investigates the spatial heterogeneity of public’s preferences for the implementation of a new country-wide forest management and protection program in Poland. Spatial econometric methods and high resolution geographical information system data related to forest characteristics are used to explain the variation in individual-specific willingness to pay (WTP) values, derived from a discrete choice experiment study. We find that respondents’ WTP is higher the closer they live to their nearest forest, and the scarcer forests are in the area where they live. Interestingly, the higher the ecological value of forests in respondents’ area, the more people prefer extending areas of national forest protection. We also investigate spatial patterns in individual-specific WTP scores and in latent class membership probabilities, finding that preferences are indeed spatially clustered. We argue that this clustering should be taken into account in forest management and policy-making. Publisher PDF

Every year from 2000 to 2010, our planet lost native forests roughly the size of Costa Rica ( FAO 2010 ). This rapid deforestation has dramatically changed the chemical composition of the world’s atmosphere, the level of biodiversity, and the presence of vegetation key to maintaining watershed function and preventing landslides. There has been a boom in the design of local and international policy instruments to prevent further deforestation and to encourage forest growth. This article reviews the theory and evidence surrounding forest-related payment for ecosystem services (PES) schemes intended to slow and reverse deforestation. We cover the most recent work touching on a range of issues related to PES programs, including research on targeting, contract design, environmental effectiveness, challenges to program implementation, spillovers, and distributional considerations of conditional cash transfers. We also highlight areas of potential future research.

Although mankind depends on the forest in so many ways (ecological, social, economic), its destruction continues, the negative impact of illegal cutting increasing with the shrinking of the forest area. The study presented in this paper aims to illustrate the evolution of the forest area and timber volume harvested in Romania, during the period 1990-2013, as well as the interdependence between the two variables. In the analysis and interpretation of data was used a linear regression model. It is also analyzed the situation of illegal cutting of trees in the forests of Romania between 2009-2012. These, alongside uncontrolled deforestation and the insufficient level of reforestation, are the most pressing problems of forests in Romania. As part of the forest fund management, there are presented a series of measures and actions to combat the phenomena which has negative effects on forests.

Using "grown fuels", as opposed to "fossil fuels" such as coal, natural gas and oil can be a possible solution to the global energy crisis by creating a decentralized power generation network. Wood is among the most efficient sources of bioenergy in terms of quantity of energy released by unit of carbon emitted compared with other energy crops. Research, development and innovation create new opportunities for the process of gathering and transforming the raw material into energy. Innovation should be targeted to deliver sustainability, biodiversity and economic growth. Romanian has a high potential and can develop energy forestry in order to reduce CO2 emissions and ensure an alternative energy solution and an energy reserve. This paper aims to analize the challenges and opportunities the biomass energy industry creates in the context of climate change mitigation which must be seen from an entrepreneurial perspective in Romania.

This paper presents an adjusted Faustmann Rule for optimal harvest of a forest in the presence of a social cost of carbon emissions. A contribution of the paper is to do this within theoretical and numerical frameworks that take account of the dynamics and interactions of the forest's multiple carbon pools within an infinite time horizon model. With our less restrictive assumptions we find that a social cost of carbon has a significantly stronger effect on the optimal harvest age than found in earlier studies. Considered is also how increased use of harvest residues for energy purposes and storage of carbon in building materials and furniture should influence the length of the rotation period. The theoretical results are quantified within a numerical framework.

Considering the many challenges facing businesses and the need for continuous improvement in all aspects, are desirable solutions to the corresponding evolution of business firms, as close to the path proposed in the medium-term development strategy and term. If passed, the entire production could be sold and services unproblematic in terms of customer appreciation, today organizations are forced to adapt to new conditions taking into account challenges due to customers new technologies, competition increasingly fierce, and not Lastly legislation. Now companies must be more malleable to provide good services and to continuously improve the work. The right solution to achieve all expectations is the Total Quality Management.

The relationship between forests and human nutrition is not yet well understood. A better understanding of this relationship is vital at a time when the majority of new land for agriculture is being cleared from forests. We use Demographic Health Survey food consumption data for over 93,000 children from 21 African countries and Global Land Cover Facility tree cover data to examine the relationship between tree cover and three key indicators of the nutritional quality of children’s diets: dietary diversity, fruit and vegetable consumption, and animal source food consumption. Our main findings can be summarized as follows: there is a statistically significant positive relationship between tree cover and dietary diversity; fruit and vegetable consumption increases with tree cover until a peak of 45% tree cover and then declines; and there is no relationship between animal source food consumption and tree cover. Overall our findings suggest that children in Africa who live in areas with more tree cover have more diverse and nutritious diets.

Bio-energy with carbon capture and sequestration (BECCS) has the potential to be a key mitigation option, because it can generate electricity and absorb emissions at the same time. However, biomass is not distributed evenly across the globe and regions with a potentially high demand might be constrained by limited domestic supply. Therefore, climate mitigation policies might create the incentive to trade biomass internationally. This paper uses scenarios generated by the integrated assessment model WITCH to study trade of woody biomass from multiple perspectives: the volume of biomass traded, its value, the impact on other power generation technologies and on the efficiency of mitigation policy. The policy scenarios consist of three representative carbon tax policies (4.8 W/m 2 , 3.8 W/m 2 and 3.2 W/m 2 radiative forcing values in 2100) and a cap-and-trade scheme (3.8 W/m 2 in 2100). Results show that the incentive to trade biomass is high: at least 50% of biomass consumed globally is traded internationally. Regions trade 13–69 EJ/yr of woody biomass in 2050 and 55–81 EJ/yr in 2100. In 2100 the value of biomass traded is equal to US$ 0.7–7.2 Trillion. Trade of woody biomass substantially increases the efficiency of the mitigation policy. In the tax scenarios, abatement increases by 120–323 Gt CO 2 over the century. In the cap-and-trade scenario biomass trade reduces the price of emission allowances by 34% in 2100 and cumulative discounted policy costs by 14%.

Governing carbon stored in natural and human-managed ecosystems is an emerging area in global climate politics. Many developed and developing countries are devising and implementing a range of reform programs that aim to reduce emissions and increase sequestration in the land use, land use change and forestry, and agricultural sectors. In developing countries, mitigation programs and projects on the ground have accelerated under the global program Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+). The article applies a governmentality framework to analyze these policies and programs as forms of administrative, economic, and deliberative rationalities and associated technologies. What emerges in the analysis is that governing is conducted through common technologies including policy instruments and rules, stakeholder engagement processes, and the application of the same technical monitoring and carbon accounting methodologies. In the case of REDD+, there has been strong emphasis on the introduction of market and incentive approaches, but the major reforms have focused on government regulatory programs and building technical and administrative capacity. Importantly, this is allowing national and sub-national governments to extend their authority across all aspects of the reform agenda, which poses significant challenges for reducing forest loss in developing countries. © 2013 by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The simultaneous bid auction is a standard method for sellers to solicit offers from buyers. A simple alternative is for a seller to ask buyers to make offers sequentially. If it is costly for buyers to participate, the sequential mechanism will tend to be more efficient than the simultaneous auction because later potential buyers can condition their participation decisions on earlier bids. However, the sequential mechanism’s greater efficiency may not produce higher revenues because while the possibility of deterring later potential entrants can lead early bidders to bid aggressively, the fact that later firms might be deterred will tend to reduce revenues. The relative revenue performance of the mechanisms will therefore depend on whether the threat of potential future competition, which can raise bids in the sequential mechanism, is more valuable to the seller than actual competition, which will tend to be greater in the simultaneous auction. The relative revenue performance of these alternative mechanisms has direct implications for how assets should be sold. In the case of how to structure the sale of corporations, this question has attracted attention from practitioners and commentators since the Delaware Supreme Court’s 1986 Revlon decision charged a board overseeing the sale of a company with the duty of “getting the best price for the stockholders” (Revlon v. McAndrews and Forbes Holdings 1986). In practice

In this paper, we studied four of the nine dimensions of organizational climate defined under the model proposed by Litwin and Stringer. These are structure, rewards, relationships and identity. We specifically examine the area of production of forest common land in El Brillante, Durango, Mexico in 2012. We surveyed 70 workers in the production area. The measuring instrument assessed four dimensions on the Likert scale. The Cronbach Alpha coefficient was determined with a 0.935 reliability. Dimensions were identified according to the staff evaluation of the organization. The results lead us to conclude that in the structure dimension, the staff agrees with the organizational common land structure. As for the reward dimension, it was identified that the common land has contributed positively in their motivation and provides the necessary training for the development of their work. For the relationship dimension it was observed that they are in harmony and have clear, precise and fluid communication. In the identity dimension, the staff feels as an important part that contributes to the achievement of common land goals and they enjoy working within it.

In two recent papers, Asante and Armstrong (2012) and Asante et al. (2011) considered the question of optimal harvest ages. They found that the larger are the initial pools of dead organic matter (DOM) and wood products, the shorter is the optimal rotation period. In this note, it is found that this conclusion follows from the fact that the authors ignored all release of carbon from decomposition of DOM and wood products after the time of the first harvest. When this is corrected for, the sizes of the initial stocks of DOM and wood products do not influence the optimal rotation period. Moreover, in contrast to the conclusions in the two mentioned papers, our numerical analysis indicates that inclusion of DOM in the model leads to longer, not shorter, rotation periods.

This research brings together studies of non-state actors (NSAs) in environmental negotiations, transnational networks, and institutional fragmentation, to shed light on the influence of NSAs on policy-making in regime complexes. It presents a new analytical framework with a series of deductive assumptions about the influence of “multi-forum” NSAs, as compared with “single forum” NSAs. Multi-forum NSAs cover several elements of a regime complex, and are thereby able to follow and potentially influence fragmented institutional processes. Focusing on two cases of fragmented environmental governance—forestry and access to genetic resources—the analysis provides a quantitative (statistics, network analysis) and qualitative (interviews) testing ground for the proposed framework. Because of their considerable material, organizational and ideational resources, and long-term engagement, multi-forum NSAs have greater access to the negotiations and may become central players. The strategies such NSAs adopt can further the integration of regime complexes when they undertake forum linking, or push towards further fragmentation when they undertake forum shopping or forum shifting. © 2013 by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Apesar da conjuntura desfavorável verificada após o ano de 2008, a orientação exportadora da Fileira Florestal para o mercado externo continuou a expandir-se. Este trabalho aprofunda o estudo da sua orientação exportadora e diversificação, e fornece uma análise comparada de competitividade a nível mundial, recorrendo a um conjunto vasto de instrumentos, como as quotas de mercado no mundo e as vantagens comparativas reveladas. Em 2010, a Fileira Florestal tornou-se o quarto «sector» nacional com maior vantagem comparativa. A nível mundial, Portugal é sexto neste ranking e aufere do 22.º lugar na quota mundial de exportação. A delimitação estatística do que intitulámos a «Fileira Florestal», resulta de um trabalho criterioso de selecção e validação do contexto e da importância de cada produto, ao nível mais desagregado da Nomenclatura Combinada (NC) do Comércio Internacional, de onde resultou uma lista de 413 códigos da NC-8

Set-asides and subsidies are used extensively in government procurement and natural resource sales. We analyze these policies in an empirical model of U.S. Forest Service timber auctions. The model fits the data well both within the sample of unrestricted sales where we estimate the model, and when we predict (out of sample) bidder entry and prices for small business set-asides. Our estimates suggest that restricting entry to small businesses substantially reduces efficiency and revenue, although it does increase small business participation. An alternative policy of subsidizing small bidders would increase revenue and small bidder profit, while eliminating almost all of the efficiency loss of set-asides, and only slightly decreasing the profit of larger firms. We explain these findings by connecting to the theory of optimal auction design.

A popular environmental policy is to pay forest owners for avoiding deforestation on their land. This is an example of “payments for ecosystem services” (PES). This paper shows that liquidity constraints can limit the effectiveness of PES programs. If an individual would have cut down trees to sell them, his opportunity costs are more front-loaded than the stream of PES income. If credit constrained, he might decline the program even if the net present value (NPV) of the PES income exceeds the NPV of his opportunity costs. I present evidence consistent with this prediction using data on forest owners in Uganda.

This paper presents an approach for studying the socio-economic benefits and costs (CBA) of the introduction of intensified management measures in forestry. Besides from valuation of changes in timber production, assessments of different types of externalities are included in the assessment. The model is exemplified with the use of data from a Swedish governmental study undertaken in 2009 which present impacts on the Swedish forest sector if intensified management measures are applied on environmentally low-valued land and abandoned agricultural lands. The CBA shows that intensified management measures typically are private financially profitable. If these measures also become profitable from the society’s point of view depend on the size of the external effects including carbon balance.

Many states in India have initiated various measures to protect their forest resources. Maharashtra is no exception to this phenomenon. An attempt, therefore, has been made in this paper to examine the extent to which this state is successful in conserving and managing its forest resources. The main foci of attention of this study are on evaluating various forest related indicators of Maharashtra such as distribution of forest area, outturn of major and minor forest produce, income and expenditure pattern on state forestry, extent of social forestry, and afforestation, etc. The study revealed very interesting observations. One of the major observations of this study was the sharp decline in revenue receipts from state forestry, especially after the late eighties period. Very slow growth in total value of forest produce harvested and a sharp increase in total expenditure on state forestry were found to be the major causative factors responsible for this decline in revenue receipts. Although the Government has banned felling of trees in many parts of the state, it has also adversely affected not only the harvesting of forest produce and thereby revenue receipts from state forestry but also the working of FLCS in the state. The study provides certain policy suggestions that will not only help the state to increase its revenue receipts from state forestry but also in respect of achieving its goal of maintaining ecological balance in the state.

Forest management affects the quantity of CO2 emissions in the atmosphere by carbon sequestration in standing biomass, carbon storage in forest products and production of bioenergy that replace fossil fuels. The main question in this paper is whether forest sequestration is worth increasing at the expense of bioenergy and forest products to achieve EU’s emission reduction target to 2050 cost-effectively. The assessment is based on numerical calculations using a dynamic, partial equilibrium model of cost-effective solutions, where three abatement methods in the forest sector are included together with abatement in the fossil fuel sector. The results show that forest sequestration in standing biomass is cost-effective compared to bioenergy. When sequestration is taken into account, net present costs for meeting EU carbon targets can be reduced by 18%. This is achieved through an increase in annual carbon sequestration by 30-158 million ton CO2. The overall cost of reaching the 80 per cent carbon reduction target amounts to 2,002 billion Euros when sequestration is included in the policy, but increases to 2,371 billion Euros without sequestration. Results suggest that forests can serve as a cost-efficient carbon sink over the considered time period.

This paper analyzes the role of afforestation-reforestation and timber management activities, and their major and secondary economic effects in stabilizing climate during the first commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol. In particular, with a Computable General Equilibrium framework, the ICES model, it is inferred how forest carbon sequestration fits within the European domestic portfolio of a 2020-20 and 2020-30 climate stabilization policy. Afforestation and land use are accounted for by introducing their effects in the model. This is done by relying on carbon sequestration curves provided by Sohngen (2005), which describe the average annual cost of sequestration for selected world regions. Results show that afforestation and timber management could lead to substantially lower policy costs if included. By allowing afforestation alone it is possible to achieve the 30% emissions reduction target with an additional European effort of only 0.2% compared with the cost of a 20% emissions reduction without afforestation. The introduction of these alternatives for mitigating climate is expected to reduce carbon price by around 30% in 2020 and the already contained leakage effect (around 1%), coming from an independent European commitment, by 0.2%.

urvey-based methods for eliciting preferences have been a mainstay in vari-ous strands of research, including the valuation of public goods, the study of transportation mode choice, the measurement of the value of a statistical life, and the marketing of consumer products. More recently, surveys have been used to measure economic variables such as income expectations, life expectancy, and the level of happiness. Stated preference surveys are often the only practical approach for gauging preferences for non-market goods and for evaluating public policies prior to their implementation. In particular, these methods are widely recognized as the only approach for measuring passive-use values such as the existence value of endangered species protection. Estimates of non-market values are important com-ponents of many government-mandated benefit-cost analyses, and are admitted as evidence in legal proceedings over environmental damages (e.g., following an oil spill). Despite the widespread use of these methods, the role of economic incentives in shaping participant responses remains poorly understood.

Overreliance on biomass energy, such as firewood and charcoal, for cooking in developing countries has contributed to high rates of deforestation and resulted in substantial indoor pollution, which has negatively impacted the health of many individuals. However, the effectiveness of public policies aimed at encouraging households to switch to cleaner fuels, such as liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) and kerosene, hinges on the extent to which they are mentally committed to specific fuels. Using data on four cooking fuels (charcoal, firewood, LPG, and kerosene) from the Ghana living standards survey, we found strong evidence that the most preferred fuel is LPG, followed by charcoal, with kerosene the least preferred. In addition, with the exception of kerosene that has price-elastic demand, the price elasticities of demand for the fuel types examined are inelastic. This finding suggests the so-called fuel-ladder is not robust.

In this paper, we develop a multiple forest use model to determine the optimal harvest date for a forest stand producing both timber and carbon benefits under a risk of fire. The preferences of the representative non-industrial private forest (NIPF) owner are modeled though an expected utility specification. We introduce saving as a decision of the forest owner at any time. The problems of forest management and saving decisions are solved simultaneously using a stochastic dynamic programming method. A numerical programming method is used to characterize the optimal forest and saving policies. We apply this framework to model the behavior of a representative NIPF owner located in the Southwest of France. The empirical application indicates that a higher risk of fire will decrease the optimal rotation period, while higher carbon prices will increase the optimal harvesting age. We show that increasing the risk of fire leads to a reduction in rotation duration. On the contrary, a higher carbon price makes carbon sequestration more profitable, thereby leading to increasing the rotation duration. We then show how the carbon price/risk of fire frontier is affected by risk aversion.

Este documento presenta evidencias de que las características ambientales, la infraestructura vial, los derechos propietarios y los aspectos demográficos son determinantes de la deforestación en Bolivia. Para ello se realizaron estimaciones por mínimos cuadrados ordinarios, y posteriormente se comprobó la existencia de interdependencia entre las regiones examinadas, estimándose en este último caso un modelo espacial de retardos.

A vegetação de caatinga, usada para produção de lenha e carvão, resulta em renda para as famílias rurais da região Nordeste. O Ibama cogitou o cancelamento da isenção de taxa de vistoria aos produtores de carvão com plano de manejo florestal. O modelo principal-agente desenvolvido enfatiza que a probabilidade de um produtor desmatar além do limite estabelecido no plano de manejo depende da pena estipulada pelo principal (Ibama) para tal infração. Simulações indicaram que a isenção da taxa pode reduzir sensivelmente a probabilidade de desmatamento além do limite pré-estabelecido, quando existem situações favoráveis à obtenção de receitas em outras atividades.

National government-funded payments for environmental services (PES) programs often lack sustainable financing and fail to target payments to providers of important environmental services. In principle, these problems can be mitigated by supplementing government financing with contributions from leading environmental service users. We use original survey data and official statistics to analyze user financing in Costa Rica’s renowned national PES program, focusing on the amounts and sources of user financing, the drivers of contributions, and contributors’ perceptions of the PES program. We find that user financing has supported less than three percent of the acres enrolled in the program and that hydroelectric plants are the largest private sector contributors. Large hydroelectric plants tend to contribute while small ones do not. The weight of evidence suggests that in addition to ensuring the provision of forest environmental services, hydroelectric plants’ motives for contributing to the PES program include improving relations with local communities and government regulators — common drivers of participation in all manner of voluntary environmental programs. These findings raise questions about the potential of user financing to improve the efficiency and financial sustainability of national PES programs.

The accountancy provides knowledge which can help managers make decisions about economic efficiency. This paper introduces few accounting instruments whose practical applications provide necessary knowledge for decision-making process, with the usage of concrete examples from forestry. The essay proposes ways of transforming accounting information into necessary knowledge for managers to make informed decisions, using calculation of profitability indicators, cost indicators, financial and economic analysis, financial administration accounting tools, cash-flow and budget. The writing bring forward, also, new research in the field of forest management decision support systems.

Land use and land-use change can result in the emissions of greenhouse gases that cause climate change. Climate change also affects the productivity of land, which in turn leads to further land-use change. This paper explores the growing research on both topics. The land-use emission literature has focused on deforestation (harvests) and ignored the fact that harvests have led to a much younger and therefore growing global forest. Taking this into account, mankind’s current and future influence over land use will have a small positive effect on reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Although the literature initially focused on climate impacts alone, when adaptation is taken into account we find that climate change is likely to have benign net global impacts on market sectors related to land use. Climate impacts on nonmarket sectors, however, are much more poorly understood or measured. Furthermore, it is not yet clear whether governments will adapt or maladapt to climate change.

Many are the factors indicated by the pertinent literature concerning the causes of deforestation in Brazilian Legal Amazon. From endogenous aspects as the edafo-climatic conditions to aspects related to anthropic action, like the population movements, urban growth, and especially, the independent or induced actions of the different public and private economic agents who have acted in the region, historically configuring the processes of occupation of the land and economic exploitation of the Amazonian region. The objective of this article is to perform a causality test, in the Granger sense, in the main variables suggested as important that explain the deforestation of the Legal Amazon, in the period from 1997 to 2006. The methodology to be used is based on dynamic models for the panel data, developed by Holtz-Eakin et al. (1988) and Arellano-Bond (1991) who developed a causality test based on the seminal article of Granger (1969). Among the main results found is the empirical evidence that there is a bidirectional causality between deforestation and the areas of permanent and temporary cultures, as well as the size of the cattle herd.

The deforestation of the Amazon forest is one of the most important environmental problems faced by the Brazilian government. The economic literature points to numerous factors responsible for deforestation, and many of these are, directly or indirectly, derived from federal spending. This article analyzes, through a panel data econometric model, how federal spending can influence, or mitigate, Amazonian deforestation. The state of Pará is used as a case study, as it presents the highest degree of deforestation among all Amazonian states.

Recently, natural scientists have begun to support an interpretive turn in ecology. Yet the ethical implications of interpreting nature have not been sufficiently addressed. In this essay, I use different interpretations of nature to make three distinct but related points relevant to forestry: (1) ecological narratives should be evaluated on the basis of ethical norms, (2) the choice of which interpretations of nature and ethical norms to use in environmental policy should be conducted by a process of public deliberation, and (3) scientific narratives should be denied a priori privilege over non-scientific interpretations of nature for policy purposes.

The objective of this study is to provide an alternative characterization of the optimal value function of a certain Black- Scholes-type optimal stopping problem where the underlying stochastic process is a general random walk, i.e. the process constituted by partial sums of an IID sequence of random variables. Furthermore, the pasting principle of this optimal stopping problem is studied.

This paper studies the legal institutions set up by communities in the Italian Alps in the 13th – 19th century to manage their common pastures and forests. Over time, private-order institutions in the form of charters replaced informal arrangements sustained by the long-run interaction among villagers. Although costly to run, the charters accomplished several tasks that increased resource use efficiency. We present an empirical analysis of institutional choice of about two hundred communities and show that relative efficiency was an important factor in the selection of a governance regime.

In this paper we develop an applied general equilibrium framework for assessing socio-economic impacts of alternative renewable energy policies and apply it to the bioenergy sector. The policy scenarios are assessed in a comparative static analysis. The numerical simulation results allow us to assess and compare welfare and distributional impacts of alternative renewable energy policies. Our empirical findings suggest that the bioenergy sector in Poland would benefit most from an indirect tax reduction. According to our simulation results, reducing the fossil energy sectors’ subsidies would be the second best policy option.

Stated preference (SP) surveys have been conducted to value non-timber benefits (NTBs) from forests in Norway, Sweden and Finland for about 20 years. The paper first reviews the literature and summarises methodological traditions in SP research in the three countries. Second, a meta-regression analysis is conducted explaining systematic variation in Willingness-to-Pay (WTP). Two important conclusions emerge, with relevance for future research: (1) WTP is found to be insensitive to the size of the forest, casting doubt on the use of simplified WTP/area measures for complex environmental goods; and (2) WTP tends to be higher if people are asked as individuals rather than on behalf of their household.

From an economics perspective, forest policy can be evaluated not only with an efficiency criterion, but also with a distributional perspective. An instrument that can combine both approaches -the efficiency and the distribution – in a cost-benefit analysis is presented. The traditional social cost benefit matrix is extended with a matrix to show changes in the distribution of income in the population. A third matrix is also included, which combines efficiency and distributional estimators in an abbreviated social welfare functions manner. The procedure is applied to the Polish Program of afforestation of agricultural lands in the 1990s. We study afforestation financed with national public funds on lands of both public and private ownership. The results show improvements in both the income distribution and the social welfare due to the afforestation program

Voluntary carbon markets, such as the Chicago Climate Exchange (CCX), were worth $90 million in 2006. This paper finds that community forestry interventions of three organizations in India are eligible to sell carbon sequestration credits on CCX. Their combined annual sequestration potential is 104,427 tons of carbon dioxide (tCO2), worth $417,708 at 2007 prices. Although this value will be difficult to realize immediately, it indicates the potential for carbon sequestration to raise rural incomes in India. These benefits can be actualized by first linking small pilot projects with CCX and then scaling up operations. Projects will also need to reduce transaction costs to raise the shares of carbon revenue that farmers receive. The diversion of land to raise tree crops needs to be balanced with food security concerns. A potentially viable approach would be to take up carbon plantations on common lands with concerned agencies acting as a liaison between farmer groups and the market.

Indonesia now has the highest deforestation rate in the world, with an average increase of about 47,600 ha per year. As a result, the nation is one of the largest emitters of greenhouse gases in the world and putting its rich biodiversity at risk. Although the literature discussing the political economy of Indonesia commercial’s logging is growing, only a small amount focuses on the relationship between migration and deforestation. Migration may contribute to the forest cover change, as migrants often face serious constraints from the local residents in claiming the land, and thus tend to find new forest land which can be used as a means of living or converted into an agricultural plantation. This paper empirically investigates the relationship between recent in-migration and deforestation in Indonesia. By combining available population census data with the satellite image data MODIS, we find a significant positive relationship between migration and deforestation at the district level using a fixed effects panel econometric framework. The results also suggest that the expanding oil palm production is one significant driver for the fast disappearance of Indonesia’s forest.

Under discussion in the US Congress is the desirability of reforming much of the US federal tax code. Recent proposals include lowering rates and broadening the tax base by, among other things, eliminating tax expenditure write-offs, preferences, and incentives. This study focuses on tax changes that might apply to the timber sector. The study looks at the effects of ending the capital gains treatment of timber, eliminating the timberland ownership form known as a real estate investment trust (REIT), restricting the deductibility of current management costs, and repealing the deductability of reforestation costs. Additionally, because our study focuses exclusively on the timber sector, it treats the rest of the federal tax system as unchanged except in one scenario, where we introduce lower corporate and individual income tax rates. We examine these changes using the Timber Supply Model, which projects their effects on timber sector investment, growing stock, harvests, prices, and international trade (net imports).

Etudes & documents; Protected areas are increasingly used as a tool to fight against deforestation. This paper presents new evidence on the spillover effects that occur in the decision to deforest and the creation of protected areas in local administrative entities in Brazilian Legal Amazon over the 2001-2011 period. We also highlight the interdependence between these two decisions. We proceed in two steps. First, we assumed that protected areas are created to stop the negative effects of deforestation on biodiversity. In order to control for the non-random location of protected areas, biodiversity indicators are used as excluded instruments. This model is estimated using a spatial model with instrumental variables. Second, a simultaneous system of spatially interrelated cross sectional equations is used to take into account the interdependence between the decision to deforest and the creation of protected areas. Our results show (i) that deforestation activities of neighboring municipalities are complements and that (ii) there is evidence of leakage in the sense that protected areas may shift deforestation to neighboring municipalities. The net effect of protected areas on deforestation remains however negative; it is moreover stable across two sub-periods. Our results confirm the important role of protected areas to curb deforestation and thereby biodiversity erosion. Moreover, they show that strategic interactions deserve attention in the effectiveness of conservation policies.

Etudes & documents; This paper deals with the forest owner’s attitude towards risk and the harvesting decision in several ways.First, we propose to characterize and quantify the forest owner’s attitude towards risk.Second, we analyze the determinants of the forest owner’s risk attitude. Finally, we determine the impact of the forest owner’s risk attitude on the harvesting decision. The French forest owner’s risk attitude is tackled by implementing a questionnaire, including a context-free measure borrowed from experimental economics. The determinants of the forest owner’s risk attitude and harvesting decision are estimated through a recursive bivariate ordered probit model. We show that French forest owners are characterized by a relative risk aversion coefficient close to 1. In addition, we found that the forest owner’s risk aversion is influenced positively and significantly by gender (female), age, and willingness to protect the environment, while the percentage of forest income in the total patrimony of the forest owner has a negative effect.Finally, we obtain that the forest owner’s risk aversion positively and significantly impacts the harvesting decision.

We study truthful revelation when a seller auctions bundles of goods and is interested in learning the buyer’s valuations for each individual good. We generalize the auction rules for the Becker- Degroot-Marschak mechanism and the Vickrey auction to induce truthful revelation.

International audience; Promoting tropical forest sustainability among corporate players is a major challenge. Many tools have been developed, but without much success. Southeast Asia has become a laboratory of globalization processes, where the development and success of agribusiness transnationals raises questions about their commitment to environmental concerns. An abundance of literature discusses what determines the behavior of Asian corporations, with a particular emphasis on cultural factors. Our hypothesis is that financial factors, such as ownership structure, may also have a fundamental role. We analyzed the audited accounts of four major Asian agribusiness transnationals. Using network analysis, we deciphered how the 931 companies relate to each other and determine the behavior of the transnationals to which they belong. We compared various metrics with the environmental commitment of these transnationals. We found that ownership structures reflect differences in flexibility, control and transaction costs, but not in ethnicities. Capital and its control, ownership structure, and flexibility explain 97% of the environmental behavior. It means that existing market-based tools to promote environmental sustainability do not engage transnationals at the scale where most of their behavior is determined. For OPEN ACCESS Forests 2015, 6 1455 the first time, the inner mechanisms of corporate governance are unraveled in agricultural and forest sustainability. New implications such as the convergence of environmental sustainability with family business sustainability emerged.