Impacts of community forest management on human economic well-being across Madagascar

Research output: Contribution to journalJournal articlepeer-review

  • Ranaivo Andriarilala Rasolofoson
  • Paul J. Ferraro
  • Giovanni Ruta
  • Maminiaina S. Rasamoelina
  • Patrick L. Randriankolona
  • Helle Overgaard Larsen
  • Julia P.G. Jones
Community Forest Management (CFM) devolves forest management to local communities to achieve conservation and human well-being goals. Yet, the evidence for CFM's impacts is mixed and difficult to interpret because of inadequate attention to rival explanations for the observed empirical patterns. In a national-scale analysis in Madagascar that carefully considers these rival explanations, we estimate CFM impacts on household living standards, as measured by per capita consumption expenditures. The estimated impact is positive, but small and not statistically different from zero. However, we can statistically reject substantial negative impacts (which others have suggested may exist). The estimated impacts vary conditional on household education and proximity to forests: they are more positive and statistically significant for households closer to forest and with more education. To help improve CFM design, scholars and practitioners should anticipate heterogeneity in CFM impacts and work to better characterize them, theoretically and empirically.
Original languageEnglish
JournalConservation Letters
Volume10
Issue number3
Pages (from-to)346–353
Number of pages8
ISSN1755-263X
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2017

    Research areas

  • Faculty of Science - Community Forest Management, Effectiveness, Falsification test, Impact Evaluation, Madagascar, Matching, Placebo test, Poverty, REDD+, Welfare

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