PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Ping Qin
AU  - Fredrik Carlsson
AU  - Jintao Xu
TI  - Forest Tenure Reform in China: A Choice Experiment on Farmers’ Property Rights Preferences
AID  - 10.3368/le.87.3.473
DP  - 2011 Aug 01
TA  - Land Economics
PG  - 473--487
VI  - 87
IP  - 3
4099  - http://le.uwpress.org/content/87/3/473.short
4100  - http://le.uwpress.org/content/87/3/473.full
SO  - Land Econ2011 Aug 01; 87
AB  - Decentralization experiments are currently underway in the Chinese forestry sector. However, researchers and policy makers tend to ignore a key question: what do forest farmers really want from reform? This paper addresses this question using a survey-based choice experiment to investigate farmers’ preferences for various property rights attributes of a forestland contract. We found that farmers are highly concerned with the types of rights provided by a contract. Reducing perceived risks of contract termination and introducing a priority right for the renewal of an existing contract significantly increases farmers’ marginal willingness to pay for a forest contract. (JEL Q51, Q58)