Forest property rights in the frame of public policies and societal change |
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| Authors: | Doru Leonard Irimie Hans Friedrich Essmann |
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| Institution: | 1. Council for Agricultural Research and Economics (CREA), Forest Monitoring and Planning Research Unit, Trento, Italy;2. Faculty of Forestry and Wood Sciences, Czech University of Life Sciences Prague, Czech Republic;3. Forestry Faculty, Technical University in Zvolen, Slovakia;4. Department of Land, Environment, Agriculture and Forestry, University of Padua, Italy;1. Department of Forest Economics and Management, Faculty of Forestry, Technical University in Zvolen, T.G. Masaryka 24, SK-96053 Zvolen, Slovakia;2. Faculty of Social and Economic Sciences, Institute of Public Policy, Comenius University in Bratislava, Mlynske luhy 4, 82105 Bratislava, Slovakia;1. Department of Forest Resources and Environmental Conservation, College of Natural Resources, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, VA 24060, United States;2. Department of Economics and Management, University of Helsinki, P.O. Box 27 (Latokartanonkaari 9), FIN-00014, Finland;3. The Finnish Forest Research Institute (METLA), P.O. Box 18, FI-01301 Vantaa, Finland;1. University of Ljubljana, Biotechnical Faculty, Department of Forestry and Renewable Forest Resources, Vecna pot 83, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia;2. Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Department of Forest Resource Management, SE-901 83 Umeå, Sweden;3. University College Dublin, School of Agriculture and Food Science, Forestry Section, Belfield, Dublin 4, Ireland;4. University of Helsinki, Department of Forest Science, P.O. Box 33, 00014, Finland;5. Natural Resources Institute Finland (Luke), Latokartanonkaari 9, 00790 Helsinki, Finland;6. European Forest Institute Central-East and South-East European Regional Office (EFICEEC-EFISEE), c/o University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna, Feistmantelstr. 4, A-1180 Vienna, Austria;7. Umeå University, Department of Geography and Economic History, SE-901 87, Umeå, Sweden;1. Biotechnical Faculty, University Ljubljana, Slovenia;2. Slovenian Institute for Adult Education, Ljubljana, Slovenia |
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| Abstract: | Property rights over natural resources became a distinct area of inquiry in environmental economics and policy in the last decades, but their role has not yet been investigated thoroughly. Transition countries represent an excellent material of analysis of various policies and institutional developments concerning the regime of use and management of natural resources. The processes of societal transformation had deep impacts on the forestry sector, entailing land reforms and subsequent changes to its institutional and organisational framework. This paper presents an analysis of the reciprocal relationship between the evolving forest property rights and the conduct of policy and economic actors, in connection with their outcomes. The theoretical framework consists of institutional economics, whose core concept is that patterns of interaction between institutions and actors produce physical outcomes, assessable by criteria such as equity and efficiency. The study concentrated on three distinct periods and the applicable property regimes. Within this framework, the impacts of the characteristics of property regimes and the general framework of socio-economic conditions on the exercise of property rights were analysed. The analysis of the conduct of forest owners in relation to the institutional design was completed by the analysis of the other actors influential for land reforms. Romanian forestry sector, in evolution from the period shortly before World War II to present, represents the case of the study. Research data were collected by interviewing/questioning, participant observation and literature review. They were analysed through an integrated method of content analysis and a matrix analysis. An important conclusion is that not only the regime of forest property is determinant for the outcomes of resource use and management, but also the general settings in which they are embedded. Another essential point is that land reforms driven by either efficiency or equity rationales are not mere diversions of the benefit stream, but complex processes with serious implications for the status of the resource at stake. |
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