Social Cooperation in the Context of Integrated Private and Common Land Management

View/ Open
File version
Accepted Manuscript (AM)
Author(s)
Kassahun, Habtamu Tilahun
Thorsen, Bo Jellesmark
Swait, Joffre
Jacobsen, Jette Bredahl
Griffith University Author(s)
Year published
2020
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
Several discrete choice experiment studies have investigated issues in the design of incentive programs to enhance the provision of ecosystem services. In these studies, ownership of land is usually private, and landowners make decisions independently of each other. However, the assumption of independence may be invalid when decision making involves a spatial setting and social networks. This study presents a new approach that accounts for social cooperation and preference interdependence across farmers in a land management context with mixed ownership. We formulate an econometric model of implicit choice set formation that ...
View more >Several discrete choice experiment studies have investigated issues in the design of incentive programs to enhance the provision of ecosystem services. In these studies, ownership of land is usually private, and landowners make decisions independently of each other. However, the assumption of independence may be invalid when decision making involves a spatial setting and social networks. This study presents a new approach that accounts for social cooperation and preference interdependence across farmers in a land management context with mixed ownership. We formulate an econometric model of implicit choice set formation that accounts for (1) farmers’ expectations regarding mutual positive benefits from cooperation in an integrated land management system, and (2) the potential interdependence of preferences across farmers within the same socio-spatial group. We show that cooperation expectations matter for the decision of whether to engage in cooperative management and also for welfare estimates. Our model can identify sources of heterogeneities arising from cooperation expectations in ways that would not be possible using a reduced-form choice model. The assumption of independence should be checked routinely in similar settings to avoid potential endogeneity problems in discrete choice models when dealing with data that have a social-spatial dimension.
View less >
View more >Several discrete choice experiment studies have investigated issues in the design of incentive programs to enhance the provision of ecosystem services. In these studies, ownership of land is usually private, and landowners make decisions independently of each other. However, the assumption of independence may be invalid when decision making involves a spatial setting and social networks. This study presents a new approach that accounts for social cooperation and preference interdependence across farmers in a land management context with mixed ownership. We formulate an econometric model of implicit choice set formation that accounts for (1) farmers’ expectations regarding mutual positive benefits from cooperation in an integrated land management system, and (2) the potential interdependence of preferences across farmers within the same socio-spatial group. We show that cooperation expectations matter for the decision of whether to engage in cooperative management and also for welfare estimates. Our model can identify sources of heterogeneities arising from cooperation expectations in ways that would not be possible using a reduced-form choice model. The assumption of independence should be checked routinely in similar settings to avoid potential endogeneity problems in discrete choice models when dealing with data that have a social-spatial dimension.
View less >
Journal Title
Environmental and Resource Economics
Volume
75
Issue
1
Copyright Statement
© 2019 Springer Netherlands. This is an electronic version of an article published in Environmental and Resource Economics, Vol. 75, pages105–136(2020). Environmental and Resource Economics is available online at: http://link.springer.com/ with the open URL of your article.
Subject
Agriculture, land and farm management
Applied economics
Other economics
Social Sciences
Science & Technology
Life Sciences & Biomedicine
Economics
Environmental Studies