IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ecolec/v166y2019ic5.html

Unintended impacts from forest certification: Evidence from indigenous Aka households in Congo

Author

Listed:
  • Doremus, Jacqueline

Abstract

Does Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification of “responsible” commercial forestry change nutrition, health and wealth for indigenous peoples, like the Aka of the Congo Basin? Using hand-collected data from the boundary of a certified and an uncertified forest in the Republic of Congo five years after certification, I compare nutrition, health, and wealth using questions that are locally salient and survey timing designed to reach semi-nomadic hunter-gatherers. Though I only observe outcomes after certification, using a spatial regression discontinuity design I find suggestive evidence that activities to satisfy forest certification may cause increased food insecurity and illness frequency for Aka households. I find no evidence of increased material wealth; instead, the poorest 15th percentile is poorer for Aka households. Non-Aka households are unaffected. Activities to satisfy FSC include a road connection, likely requested by non-Aka households, which in combination with hunting restrictions may decrease food security for Aka hunter-gatherers.

Suggested Citation

  • Doremus, Jacqueline, 2019. "Unintended impacts from forest certification: Evidence from indigenous Aka households in Congo," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 166(C), pages 1-1.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecolec:v:166:y:2019:i:c:5
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2019.106378
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800918313600
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.ecolecon.2019.106378?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or

    for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Kenneth Houngbedji & Benoit Mertens, 2022. "Plans d'aménagement forestier et conditions de vie des populations des forêts d'Afrique centrale," Post-Print hal-03954488, HAL.
    2. Zapata, Oscar, 2024. "Renewable energy and well-being in remote Indigenous communities of Canada: A panel analysis," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 222(C).
    3. Cole, Matthew T. & Doremus, Jacqueline M. & Hamilton, Stephen F., 2021. "Import restrictions by eco-certification: Quantity effects on tropical timber production," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 107(C).
    4. Xia Li & Timothy Simcoe, 2021. "Competing or complementary labels? Estimating spillovers in Chinese green building certification," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 42(13), pages 2451-2476, December.
    5. Danielle D. Legault & Logan Cochrane, 2021. "Forests to the Foreigners: Large-Scale Land Acquisitions in Gabon," Land, MDPI, vol. 10(4), pages 1-22, April.
    6. Degnet, Mohammed B. & van der Werf, Edwin & Ingram, Verina & Wesseler, Justus, 2022. "Community perceptions: A comparative analysis of community participation in forest management: FSC-certified and non-certified plantations in Mozambique," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    7. Nakaishi, Tomoaki & Chapman, Andrew, 2024. "Eco-labels as a communication and policy tool: A comprehensive review of academic literature and global label initiatives," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 202(C).
    8. Yuan Huang & Yali Wen, 2025. "Perception over Possession: How Farmers’ Subjective Tenure Security and Forest Certification Drive Sustainable Bamboo Management," Land, MDPI, vol. 14(10), pages 1-18, October.
    9. Halalisan, Florin & Romero, Claudia & Popa, Bogdan & Arana Landin, German & Talpa, Nicolae & ABRUDAN, Ioan Vasile, 2023. "Global assessment of FSC forest management certification auditing through analysis of accreditation reports," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 131(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • Q56 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Environment and Development; Environment and Trade; Sustainability; Environmental Accounts and Accounting; Environmental Equity; Population Growth
    • O13 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Agriculture; Natural Resources; Environment; Other Primary Products
    • O18 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Urban, Rural, Regional, and Transportation Analysis; Housing; Infrastructure

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:ecolec:v:166:y:2019:i:c:5. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/ecolecon .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.