How to reduce mangrove forest extraction in the mekong river delta of vietnam a common pool resource experiment

UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS, HO CHI MINH CITY VIET NAM – NETHERLANDS PROJECT FOR M.A PROGRAM IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS HOW TO REDUCE MANGROVE FOREST EXTRACTION IN THE MEKONG RIVER DELTA OF VIETNAM? A COMMON POOL RESOURCE EXPERIMENT o0o A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS By VU QUANG VINH Academic Supervisor: TRUONG DANG THUY HO CHI MINH CITY, DECEMBER 2015 Vu Quang Vinh Thesis VNP20 UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMIC INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL STUDIES HO CHI MINH CITY THE HAGUE VIET NAM THE NETHERLANDS VIETNAM – NETHERLANDS PROGRAMME FOR M.A IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS HOW TO REDUCE MANGROVE FOREST EXTRACTION IN THE MEKONG RIVER DELTA OF VIETNAM? A COMMON POOL RESOURCE EXPERIMENT A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS By VU QUANG VINH Academic Supervisor: TRUONG DANG THUY HO CHI MINH CITY, DECEMBER 2015 Vu Quang Vinh Thesis VNP20 DECLARATION “This is to certify that this thesis entitled “How to reduce mangrove forest extraction in the Mekong River Delta of Vietnam? A Common Pool Resource Experiment”, which is submitted by me in fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Art in Development Economics to the Vietnam – The Netherlands Programme (VNP) The thesis constitutes only my original work and due supervision and acknowledgement have been made in the text to all materials used.” Vu Quang Vinh Vu Quang Vinh Thesis VNP20 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis would not have been able to finish without the support and guidance from many people Firstly, I wish to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor Truong Dang Thuy for the continuous support of my thesis, for his generosity and dedication in sharing his wisdom guiding me to rethink and to deconstruct my thesis topic His excellent guidance helped me in all the time of research and writing of this thesis He spent a lot of time to support me about the reference materials as well as give me advices about what should to for my thesis Moreover, he took time to diligently review all my thesis drafts and help me correct errors and clear my thinking as well Moreover, the most wonderful thing is that he provided me an opportunity to join his team as intern, let me experience the research of mangrove forest in the field and gave access to the experimental data and research facilities Besides my supervisor, I would also like to thank all my friends here at VNP Together we have struggled through this whole treasured journey of learning and shared memorable moments I thank my fellows for their insightful comments and the stimulating discussions, they were always willing to help and give me best suggestions Then, I express my gratitude to VNP officers as well as VNP librarian for their support of comfort lab room and study materials and I want to say thanks to EEPSEA for funding the data collection Finally, I would like to thank my family for supporting me spiritually throughout writing this thesis and to my girl friend who always stood by me through the good times and difficult Vu Quang Vinh Thesis VNP20 ABBREVIATIONS ASEAN Association of Southeast Asian Nations CICES The Common International Classification of Ecosystem Services CPR Common Pool Resource FAO Agriculture Organization of the United Nations GIZ Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit ICZN Integrated Coastal Zone Management ICZN/CCCEP Integrated Coastal Zone Management/ Climate Change and Coastal Ecosystems in Mekong Delta Vietnam Program MARD Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development MONRE Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment OLS Ordinary Least Square PES Payments for Environmental Services UNCED The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development WCED World Council of Environmental and Development Vu Quang Vinh Thesis VNP20 ABSTRACT Using data from series of experiment in six selected provinces in Southwestern Vietnam in March and April 2015, this thesis aims to analyze the impact of mangrove forest policies and programs on people behavior towards exploring mangrove forest Common pool resource experiment is applied to examine the behavior of people in making decision To control for heterogeneity of individuals, I utilize the past behavior proposed by Frey and Meier (2004) There is robust evidence that people will quickly change their behavior if their profitability is varied, however, the local authorities must control the unexpected influence in using financial reward In addition, it suggested that government should combine many measures to get more successful in inducing people to protect mangrove forest Keywords: Mangrove forest, Common pool resource, Game theory, Experiment Vu Quang Vinh Thesis VNP20 TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter 1: Introduction 1.1 Problem statement 1.2 Research question 1.3 Scope OF STUDY 1.4 Methodology and data 1.5 The structure of the study Chapter 2: Literature review 2.1 Mangrove’s ecological services 2.2 Mangrove forest and market failures 2.3 Literature review on the common pool resources experiments 2.4 Main hypotheses 15 Chapter 3: Methodology and data 19 3.1 Methodology 19 3.2.1 Sampling strategy 19 3.2.2 The interview 19 The structure of questionnaire 19 Procedures of interviewing 21 3.2.3 The experiment 21 Experimental design 21 Payoffs 23 Additional information 25 Procedures of conducting CPR game 25 3.2 Data 26 Chapter 4: Empirical results 29 4.1 Mangrove forest in vietnam 29 4.1.1 The current situation of mangrove forests in the Mekong River Delta 29 4.1.2 The situation of mangroves management in the Mekong River Delta 31 4.1.3 The current situation of other common pool resources in Vietnam 33 Fishing 33 Water 34 Forest 34 4.2 Non-parametric analysis 35 4.2.1 Descriptive statistics 35 4.2.2 Treatment 1: information 39 Vu Quang Vinh 4.2.3 4.3 Thesis VNP20 Treatment and treatment 3: social comparison and profitability 39 Regression results 43 4.4 Discussion 49 4.4.1 Hypotheses 49 4.4.2 Other discussions and limitations 51 Chapter 5: Conclusions and policy implications 53 5.1 Conclusions 53 5.2 Policy implications 53 References 55 Appendix 60 Vu Quang Vinh Thesis VNP20 LIST OF FIGURES Figure 4-1: Chart of change in mangroves area of Vietnam from 1943 to 2013 29 Figure 4-2: ASEAN mangrove forest distribution map (NASA/USGS) 30 Figure 4-3: Chart of change in mangroves area of the South Vietnam from 1943 to 2008 31 Figure 4-4: The average extraction in 20 rounds 36 Figure 4-5: The average extraction with treatments distinction 37 Figure 4-6: Frequencies of extraction area in two stages by treatment groups 38 Figure 4-7: The average extraction in 20 rounds with treatment of information 39 Figure 4-8: The average extraction in 20 rounds with treatment of social comparison 40 Figure 4-9: The average extraction in 20 rounds with treatment of profitability 41 Figure 4-10: The average payoff and average extraction across social comparison treatment over 20 rounds 52 Vu Quang Vinh Thesis VNP20 LIST OF TABLES Table 2-1: Comparison between ecological wetland and ecological mangrove functions Table 3-1: Description of some variables 27 Table 4-1: Summary about forest-holders and forest types 33 Table 4-2: The changes in forest area from 1945 to 2002 (unit: 1,000,000 hectares) 35 Table 4-3: The average extraction through treatments 38 Table 4-4: Summary of main characteristics 42 Table 4-5: Regressions for individual extracted area 43 Table 4-6: Regressions with three treatments 46 Table 4-7: The average payoff across treatments and stages (units: VND) 48 LIST OF APPENDIX Appendix 1: Introduction to game rules 60 Appendix 2: The payoff table 64 Appendix 3: Information sheet 69 Appendix 4: Consent form 72 Appendix 5: Questionnaire table 73 Appendix 6: Three types of mangrove forest and their main functions 117 Appendix 7: The situation of mangroves in some provinces in Mekong Delta region in 2012 118 Appendix 8: Global mangrove forest distribution map (NASA/USGS) 118 Appendix 9: The correlation matrix 119 ... TO REDUCE MANGROVE FOREST EXTRACTION IN THE MEKONG RIVER DELTA OF VIETNAM? A COMMON POOL RESOURCE EXPERIMENT A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER... largest areas are Indonesia, Brazil and Australia account for 21%, 9% and 7% of total mangrove forest area respectively Mangrove forests provide a wide range of vital services as well as play an important... Mangrove forest in vietnam 29 4.1.1 The current situation of mangrove forests in the Mekong River Delta 29 4.1.2 The situation of mangroves management in the Mekong River Delta