Luận văn thạc sĩ UEH how to reduce mangrove forest extraction in the mekong river delta of vietnam

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

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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

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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

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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 do 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.

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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

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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

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chapter 1: Introduction ............................................................................................................... 1

1.1 Problem statement............................................................................................................ 1

1.2 Research question ............................................................................................................. 3

1.3 Scope OF STUDY ............................................................................................................. 3

1.4 Methodology and data...................................................................................................... 4

1.5 The structure of the study ................................................................................................ 5

Chapter 2: Literature review....................................................................................................... 6

2.1 Mangrove’s ecological services........................................................................................ 6

2.2 Mangrove forest and market failures ............................................................................. 7

2.3 Literature review on the common pool resources experiments.................................... 9

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

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4.2.3 Treatment 2 and treatment 3: social comparison and profitability....................... 39

4.3 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

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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

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LIST OF TABLES

Table 2-1: Comparison between ecological wetland and ecological mangrove functions............. 6

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

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1

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

1.1 PROBLEM STATEMENT

The concept of “sustainable development” appeared in the report “Our Common Future”

by the World Council of Environmental and Development (WCED) of United Nations in 1987.

It is defined as “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the

ability of future generations to meet their own need.” The Earth Summit on Environment and

Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro in 1992 and the World Summit on Sustainable

Development in Johannesburg in 2002 identified a “sustainable development” should satisfy

economic development, social development and environmental protection. Sustainable

development is the inevitable trend in the evolution of human society. In there, environmental

protection is one of the imperative needs in the context of status of global climate changes.

Vietnam is one of countries that are greatly influenced by climate change; furthermore, the

economic-society development still depends heavily on the exploitation of natural resources.

Therefore, protecting natural resources in general and common pool resources in particular are

the priority issues have to be resolved thoroughly.

Mangrove forest, which is one of common pool resources, provides material for healthy,

living and manufacturing, energy source, protect people from storm, tsunami as well as

contribute to mitigate the impacts of climate changes such as global warming. In Vietnam,

because of important role of mangrove forests in protecting seashore the government conducted

many programs and policies to improve the situation of mangroves. However, the obtained

results are not satisfactory: during the early period (2000 – 2006), there is a significant increase

in area but in recent years, the mangrove forest area tends to decline (2008 – 2013). This result

raises several questions about the efficiency as well as the rationality of related measures that

government researched and deployed. Moreover, the individuals and households who are

subjects of these programs and policies are also considered as a factor in interpreting the results.

In the mangrove forest area in Vietnam, the living conditions of most people are so difficult,

and they often use backward methods to do for a living. In addition, there is unreasonable in

making practical and effective use of mangrove forest, the local communities extract firewood,

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2

wood and seafood under the mangroves canopy but do not pay attention to restore the mangrove

forest (Que and Hai 2012). Due to these reasons, the individuals and households are the weak

links of a chain in executing mangroves conservation projects.

When introducing new policies and regulations, according to conventional economic

theories, policy makers assume that individuals will be motivated by their own interest without

regard for others. However, Cardenas, Stranlund and Willis (2000) found that people do not

always comport themselves with this way but could between self and group interests. They

explained that the external regulations that aimed to control the local environment quality can

“crowd out other-regarding behavior” and hence people will become more self-interested in

making decisions. It means that the benefits from performing new regulations are unlike the

initial expectations. And the local regulations may be ineffective if “the cost of achieving

acceptable levels of compliance” exceeds that benefits. However, individuals respond not only

the cost of performing new regulations but also other factors, i.e. their wealth (Cardenas 2003),

personal characteristics (Cárdenas and Ostrom 2004) or social context of the community

(Janssen et al. 2013). In 2005, Cardenas conducted another experiment in Colombia with

villagers and students, in which the individuals were asked about their preferences toward the

application of external regulations through voting mechanism. Cardenas (2005) pointed out that

there is a significant difference in behavior between group of villagers and group of student

when an external regulation is imposed. For this reason, the author suggested unless we replicate

the experiment in the field after doing it in the laboratory, we would miss some related

information. Base on these suggestions and other relevant paper, the simultaneous interview is

also needed. Although there is some mangrove forest research in Vietnam such as Werthmann,

Weingart and Kirk (2010), Thu and Populus (2007), many of them concentrated on survey data

and used statistical methods to analyze (Tuyen 2014; McNally, McEwin and Holland 2011).

Most of studies by Vietnamese also focused on the issues of mangrove restoration (GIZ Kien

Giang Team 2012; Que and Hai 2012), mangrove forest management (Dung and Tinh 2006;

Que and Hai 2012), or the role of mangroves (Ngot et al. 2014). However, the reality showed

that the human factors, especially those living in areas with mangrove forests, also play an

important role in protecting mangrove forest. Although other studies have also referred to the

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