The success of reducing carbon emissions from deforestation and forest degradation depends on the design of an effective financial mechanism that provides landholders sufficient incentives to ...participate and provide additional and permanent carbon offsets. This paper proposes self-enforcing contracts as a potential solution for the constraints in formal contract enforcement derived from the stylized facts of reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation implementation in developing countries. It characterizes the optimal self-enforcing contract and provides the parameters under which private enforcement is sustainable when the seller type that is, the opportunity cost of the land, is private information. The optimal contract suggests that the seller with low opportunity cost receives a positive enforceable payment equivalent to the information rents required for self-selection, in contrast to when the buyer knows the seller type in which case all payments should be made contingent on additional forest conservation. When the buyer does not know the seller type, a first-best self-enforcing contract can be implemented if forest conservation is sufficiently productive. If the gains from forest conservation are small, self-enforcing contracts may induce some carbon sequestration by some or all seller types, depending on the value of the shared gains of the relationship.
Reduction of carbon emissions from deforestation and forest degradation has been identified as a cost effective element of the post-Kyoto strategy to achieve long-term climate objectives. Its success ...depends primarily on the design and implementation of a financial mechanism that provides land-holders sufficient incentives to participate in such scheme. This paper proposes self-enforcing contracts (relational contracts) as a potential solution for the constraints in formal contract enforcement derived from the stylized facts of the implementation because relational contracting relies upon mutual private self-enforcement in a repeated transaction framework. The paper derives an opportunity cost function for land use and characterizes the optimal self-enforcing contract as well as provide the parameters under which private enforcement is sustainable. The optimal payment scheme suggests that all payments should be made contingent on the carbon offsets delivered, that is, at the end of the contracting period. Thus, the optimal contract does not observe any ex ante payment. Self-enforcement is more difficult to sustain the higher the opportunity cost of forest conservation is relative to the value of the carbon offsets from the contract. Necessary extensions to the relational contracting model are also discussed.
This paper examines whether cooperative behavior by respondents measured as contributions in a one-shot public goods game correlates with reported pro-forest collective action behaviors. All the ...outcomes analyzed are costly in terms of time, land, or money. The study finds significant evidence that more cooperative individuals (or those who believe their group members will cooperate) engage in collective action behaviors that support common forests, once the analysis is adjusted for demographic factors, wealth, and location. Those who contribute more in the public goods experiment are found to be more likely to have planted trees in community forests during the previous month and to have invested in biogas. They also have planted more trees on their own farms and spent more time monitoring community forests. As cooperation appears to be highly conditional on beliefs about others’ cooperation, these results suggest that policies to support cooperation and strengthen local governance could be important for collective action and economic outcomes associated with forest resources. As forest management and quality in developing countries is particularly important for climate change policy, these results suggest that international efforts such as the United Nations Collaborative Programme on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation should pay particular attention to supporting governance and cooperation at the local level.
This forest policy note (FPN) offers an outside view of the Moldovan forestry sector, provides some strategic guidance to help define sector goals, and identifies opportunities for consideration in ...the continued development of the sector and for the implementation of the Moldova and World Bank (WB) country partnership strategy (CPS). This study is based on a number of short visits to Moldova and on a number of background studies undertaken during the implementation of both phases of the European neighborhood and partnership instrument (ENPI) east countries, forest law enforcement and governance (FLEG) program. The WB CPS for Moldova recognizes that the forestry sector plays an important role for competitiveness and climate change but has not received the attention it deserves. This FPN builds on previous work within the forestry sector. It aims to inform the WB project formulation process and the forestry sector by reviewing the sector and highlighting the main policy issues and identifying possible actions.
Miombo woodlands stretch across Southern Africa in a belt from Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in the west to Mozambique in the east. The miombo region covers an area of around 2.4 ...million km. In some areas, miombo has been highly degraded as a result of human use (southern Malawi and parts of Zimbabwe), while in others, it remains relatively intact (such as in parts of northern Mozambique, and in isolated areas of Angola and the DRC). From a conventional forester's perspective, miombo is fundamentally uninteresting. It supports relatively few good commercial timber species. The management of commercial species has been problematic. The best areas were logged over long ago. Except in a few areas, remaining commercially viable stocks are relatively small and difficult to access. Public forestry institutions have, for the most part, failed to put in place effective management systems for forests, preferring instead to limit their role to regulation and revenue collection, rather than to management per se. The objectives of this paper are threefold, and the paper is structured around these objectives. First, in section two, the paper describes some of opportunities for improving the use and management of miombo woodlands. Second, in section three, outline some of the barriers which are preventing households, communities, and countries from adopting better and more sustainable woodland management practices. In section four, by exploring some of the policy opportunities for removing these barriers, with the objective of strengthening miombo's contribution to reducing risk and vulnerability of poor rural households through sustainable forest management.
The project is the study of urban forestry with special reference to Mutare municipal forestry situated right in the city centre of Mutare in the eastern highlands of Zimbabwe.
The World Bank's revised forest policy came into being in 2002 and covers all types of forests. It has the following key objectives: (i) harnessing the potential of forests to reduce poverty in a ...sustainable manner; (ii) integrating forests effectively into sustainable development; and (iii) protecting vital local and global environmental services and values. The policy enables the bank to fully engage in forestry throughout the developing world, while ensuring that it complies with such safe guard policies such as OP 4.01 (Environmental Assessment), OP 4.04 (Natural Habitats) and OD 4.20 (Indigenous Peoples). On the other hand, the policy provides only a general framework for its lending operations in forestry and cannot take account of the individual socio-economic and environmental needs of regions and sub regions. To carry out the work, experienced local consultants were recruited to prepare country level reports following guidelines provided by the FAO Investment Centre, the aim being to gain a strong local perspective on the main issues and potential for sustainable and equitable growth in the sector. These reports were complimented by reference to an extensive literature base to produce individual country reports and the summary which follows. Given the complexity of forestry in the region, the need to involve large numbers of stakeholders, and the need to accommodate change, the findings of this report should not be regarded as definitive, but rather as a first step to shaping the Bank's interventions in the sector in individual countries over the medium term. It should also be noted that data have been obtained from a variety of sources, and that inconsistencies and gaps were common; they should consequently be regarded as orders of magnitude.
This overview paper positions the question of benefit sharing in the context of REDD plus. It shares findings from a cursory review of a sample of Readiness Preparation Proposals (RPP) for REDD plus ...submitted to the Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF). It deconstructs the concept of benefit sharing. It also provides a summary of the main findings from three recent studies on benefit sharing that were financed by the Program on Forests (PROFOR). The PROFOR studies build on existing research. They also use primary and secondary data collected from a literature review, key informant interviews, structured surveys, and case studies. The studies: a) explore the substantive legal issues and procedural options for identifying legitimate and intended beneficiaries in situations where rights are unclear; b) provide information and tools to assist policy makers and development partners to design and develop nationally appropriate arrangements for transferring REDD plus benefits; and c) provide the local partners' perspective on benefit sharing and the process involved in determining benefits and establishing arrangements for sharing the benefits.
The objective of the Functional Review of the Environment, Water and Forestry sector (FR-EWF) is to help the Government of Romania (GoR) develop an action plan for implementation over the short- and ...medium-term to strengthen the effectiveness and efficiency of the sector administration, and provide input to the Government National Reform Program (NRP 2011- 2013) and beyond, especially in relation to those functions that support Romania's implementation of key EU directives, help speed up convergence with the environmental Acquis, remove constraints to EU structural funds absorption, and manage the country's natural assets sustainably. The report is presented in two volumes, with the first volume providing an integrated view of the sector as currently configured around environmental management, water, and forestry, and the second volume dedicated to a detailed review of the forestry sector. Volume 1 is organized as follows: Part I provides an overall introduction, objectives and context of the review; Part II summarizes the key challenges facing the sector, focusing on the three main sub-sectors, environmental management, water, and forestry; Part III reviews the strategic framework of the sector, pointing out areas where improvements will be needed; Part IV reviews the configuration of the sector, its organization and performance; Part V assesses the salient cross-cutting issues; and Part VI presents the key recommendations. Volume 2, dedicated to the forestry sub-sector, is organized along the four assessment areas.
