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Estimating the Impacts of Bolivia's Protected Areas on Poverty

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Author Info

  • Canavire Bacarreza, Gustavo Javier

    () (Universidad EAFIT)

  • Hanauer, Merlin M.

    () (Sonoma State University)

Abstract

Protected areas represent a powerful policy tool for the preservation of ecosystems and their services. The rapid proliferation of protected areas in Bolivia over the past several decades has prompted interest in understanding their impacts on surrounding populations. Recent studies from other developing countries show that protected areas have had positive impacts on poverty. Using rich biophysical and socioeconomic data from Bolivia we find that municipalities with at least 10% of their area occupied by a protected area established between 1992 and 2000 exhibited differentially greater levels of poverty reduction between 1992 and 2001 compared to similar municipalities unaffected by protected areas. We find that our results are robust to a number of econometric specifications, spillover analyses and a placebo study. Although our overarching results that Bolivia's protected areas were associated with poverty reduction are similar to previous studies, our underlying results differ subtly, but significantly. Previous studies found that controlling for key observable covariates led to fundamentally antithetical results compared to naïve (uncontrolled) estimates. Conversely, our results indicate that naïve estimates lead to an over estimation of the poverty reducing impacts of protected areas. Our results expose the heterogeneity of protected area impacts across countries and, therefore, underscore the importance of country-level impact evaluations in order to build the global knowledge base regarding the socioeconomic impacts of protected areas.

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Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) in its series IZA Discussion Papers with number 6341.

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Length: 50 pages
Date of creation: Feb 2012
Date of revision:
Publication status: published online in: World Development, 2012, Online First
Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp6341

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Related research

Keywords: ecosystems; econometrics; program evaluation; impacts; protected areas; poverty; Bolivia;

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References

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  1. Robalino, Juan A., 2007. "Land conservation policies and income distribution: who bears the burden of our environmental efforts?," Environment and Development Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 12(04), pages 521-533, August.
  2. David J. Lewis & Gary L. Hunt & DAndrew J. Plantinga, 2002. "Public Conservation Land and Employment Growth in the Northern Forest Region," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 78(2), pages 245-259.
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  6. Alexander Pfaff & Juan Robalino & G. Arturo Sanchez-Azofeifa & Kwaw S. Andam & Paul J. Ferraro, 2009. "Park Location Affects Forest Protection: Land Characteristics Cause Differences in Park Impacts across Costa Rica," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 9(2), pages 5.
  7. Robalino, Juan & Villalobos-Fiatt, Laura, 2010. "Conservation Policies and Labor Markets: Unraveling the Effects of National Parks on Local Wages in Costa Rica," Discussion Papers dp-10-02-efd, Resources For the Future.
  8. David J. Lewis & Gary L. Hunt & Andrew J. Plantinga, 2003. "Does Public Lands Policy Affect Local Wage Growth?," Growth and Change, Gatton College of Business and Economics, University of Kentucky, vol. 34(1), pages 64-86.
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  10. Sims, Katharine R.E., 2010. "Conservation and development: Evidence from Thai protected areas," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 60(2), pages 94-114, September.
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Blog mentions

As found by EconAcademics.org, the blog aggregator for Economics research:
  1. Estimating the Impacts of Bolivia's Protected Areas on Poverty
    by Maximo Rossi in Wikiprogress América Latina on 2012-03-12 13:37:00
  2. Estimating the Impacts of Bolivia's Protected Areas on Poverty
    by Maximo Rossi in Wikiprogress América Latina on 2012-03-05 17:45:00
  3. Áreas Protegidas y Pobreza en Bolivia
    by noreply@blogger.com (Nueva Economía) in Foro para una Nueva Economía on 2012-05-02 16:34:00

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