Impacts of Conservation Incentives in Protected Areas
Incentive-based conservation is a promising approach to tropical forest conservation, including within multiple-use protected areas. Here we analyze the environmental impacts of Bolsa Floresta, a longstanding forest conservation program combining conditional household payments with livelihood-focused investments in 15 multiple-use reserves of Amazonas State, Brazil. We use grid-based data, nearest-neighbor matching, and panel data econometrics to compare forest-related program outcomes (deforestation, degradation, fires) with non-participating reserves. While post-treatment deforestation and degradation was negligible, this was already the case pre-treatment, since low-threat reserves had preferentially been targeted. We thus find only statistically insignificant additional conservation effects from implementation. No important heterogeneous treatment effects could be detected either. Our findings thus add to the growing evidence that spatial mis-targeting towards low-hanging fruits, that is disproportionally selecting low-threat forest conservation areas into programs, constitutes a prime cause for low additionality found in rigorous impact evaluations of incentive-based forest conservation initiatives.
Main Authors: | , , , |
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Format: | Working Paper biblioteca |
Language: | English |
Published: |
World Bank, Washington, DC
2019-11
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Subjects: | DEFORESTATION, ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION, PROTECTED AREA, CONSERVATION, TROPICAL RAIN FOREST, TRANSFERS, |
Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/963101576773519234/Impacts-of-Conservation-Incentives-in-Protected-Areas-The-Case-of-Bolsa-Floresta-Brazil https://hdl.handle.net/10986/33077 |
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Summary: | Incentive-based conservation is a
promising approach to tropical forest conservation,
including within multiple-use protected areas. Here we
analyze the environmental impacts of Bolsa Floresta, a
longstanding forest conservation program combining
conditional household payments with livelihood-focused
investments in 15 multiple-use reserves of Amazonas State,
Brazil. We use grid-based data, nearest-neighbor matching,
and panel data econometrics to compare forest-related
program outcomes (deforestation, degradation, fires) with
non-participating reserves. While post-treatment
deforestation and degradation was negligible, this was
already the case pre-treatment, since low-threat reserves
had preferentially been targeted. We thus find only
statistically insignificant additional conservation effects
from implementation. No important heterogeneous treatment
effects could be detected either. Our findings thus add to
the growing evidence that spatial mis-targeting towards
low-hanging fruits, that is disproportionally selecting
low-threat forest conservation areas into programs,
constitutes a prime cause for low additionality found in
rigorous impact evaluations of incentive-based forest
conservation initiatives. |
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