Informal institutions and grassland protection: Empirical evidence from pastoral regions in China

Grassland has experienced continuous degradation, resulting in serious ecosystem services loss and unsustainable grazing production. Previous studies have identified the impact of formal environmental institutions or policies on grassland protection. But, little evidence of the effectiveness of informal institutions has been found. Using village grassroots governance as a proxy for informal institutions, this study empirically identifies the effects of informal institutions on grassland quality improvement. Results show that the presence of informal governance leads to improvement in grassland quality. Moreover, these positive effects are found to be more significant when informal governance is in a written form and penalties occur as a consequence of violations. Further investigations reveal that the effectiveness of informal governance is mediated by village size, villager income, household-level compensation from government conservation programs, and grassland property right privatisation. The findings offer new insights into the positive role played by informal institutions in natural resource management and would assist existing policy instruments in grassland protection.