Collective property rights lead to secondary forest growth in the Brazilian Amazon.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A
; 120(22): e2221346120, 2023 05 30.
Article
en En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-37216556
ABSTRACT
Forests serve a crucial role in our fight against climate change. Secondary forests provide important potential for conservation of biodiversity and climate change mitigation. In this paper, we explore whether collective property rights in the form of indigenous territories (ITs) lead to higher rates of secondary forest growth in previously deforested areas. We exploit the timing of granting of property rights, the geographic boundaries of ITs and two different methods, regression discontinuity design and difference-in-difference, to recover causal estimates. We find strong evidence that indigenous territories with secure tenure not only reduce deforestation inside their lands but also lead to higher secondary forest growth on previously deforested areas. After receiving full property rights, land inside ITs displayed higher secondary forest growth than land outside ITs, with an estimated effect of 5% using our main RDD specification, and 2.21% using our difference-in-difference research design. Furthermore, we estimate that the average age of secondary forests was 2.2 y older inside ITs with secure tenure using our main RDD specification, and 2.8 y older when using our difference-in-difference research design. Together, these findings provide evidence for the role that collective property rights can play in the push to restore forest ecosystems.
Palabras clave
Texto completo:
1
Banco de datos:
MEDLINE
Asunto principal:
Propiedad
/
Ecosistema
País como asunto:
America do sul
/
Brasil
Idioma:
En
Año:
2023
Tipo del documento:
Article