Land titling policy and soil conservation in the uplands of Northern Vietnam

Saint-Macary, Camille; Keil, Alwin; Zeller, Manfred; Heidhues, Franz; Dung, Pham Thi My

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Saint-Macary, Camille ; Keil, Alwin ; Zeller, Manfred ; Heidhues, Franz ; Dung, Pham Thi My

Land titling policy and soil conservation in the uplands of Northern Vietnam

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URN: urn:nbn:de:bsz:100-opus-3576
URL: http://opus.uni-hohenheim.de/volltexte/2009/357/

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SWD-Schlagwörter:

Nordvietnam , Grundeigentum , Bodenschutz

Freie Schlagwörter (Englisch):

Land titling policy , technology adoption , upland agriculture

Institut:

Institut für Agrar- und Sozialökonomie in den Tropen und Subtropen

DDC-Sachgruppe:

Landwirtschaft, Veterinärmedizin

Dokumentart:

ResearchPaper

Schriftenreihe:

Forschung zur Entwicklungsökonomie und -politik / Research in development economics and policy

Bandnummer:

2008,3

Sprache:

Englisch

Erstellungsjahr:

2008

Publikationsdatum:

15.05.2009

Lizenz:

Veröffentlichungsvertrag mit der Universitätsbibliothek Hohenheim ohne Print-on-Demand

Kurzfassung auf Englisch:

In Vietnam, a quasi private property regime has been established in 1993 with the issuance of exchangeable and mortgageable long term land use right certificates. Using primary qualitative and quantitative data collected in a mountainous district of Northern Vietnam, this paper investigates the role of the land policy in the adoption of soil conservation technologies by farmers. This issue is of crucial importance in the region where population growth and growing market demands have induced farmers to intensify agricultural production. While poverty has been reduced, environmental problems such as soil erosion, landslides, and declining soil fertility have become more severe over the past years. Among the abundant literature on the impact of property rights and formal land titles in developing countries, only a few studies have focused on the adoption of soil conservation technologies: an important element in sustainable development strategies of fragile agro-ecological areas confronted with increasing population densities.
Our findings suggest that soil conservation technologies are perceived as being economically unattractive; therefore, most upland farmers continue to practice the prevailing erosion-prone cultivation system. Focusing on agroforestry as one major soil conservation option, we estimate household and plot level econometric models to empirically assess the determinants of adoption. We find that the possession of a formal land title influences adoption, but that the threat of land re-allocations in villages discourages adoption by creating uncertainty and tenure insecurity.
We conclude that more efforts are needed from decision-makers to promote and support the adoption of conservation practices and to clarify objectives of the land policy in order to secure land tenure and foster sustainable development in fragile areas.