Abstract
Protected areas are an essential policy tool for biodiversity conservation in China as elsewhere, yet the impact of protected area policies on the livelihood of local households in China remains unknown. We contend that the protected area policy achieves the two goals of ecological conservation and livelihood improvement simultaneously. In this study, we empirically investigated the influence of the protected area policy on local households’ risk perception, forest investment, and forest revenue. We analyzed a sample consisting of households located inside or adjacent to two protected areas, namely, Wuyishan National Park and Longqishan Nature Reserve, both in Fujian Province. A total of 211 valid questionnaires were collected in 2021, and the data were analyzed using structural equation modeling. The results indicate that the establishment of protected areas has a positive impact on forest revenues, mediated by risk perception and forest investment, while the average levels of perceived damage increased and perceived security decreased due to the protected area policy. Our study has implications for policymakers seeking to improve biodiversity and household livelihood around protected areas.
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Data availability
The data and materials used to support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
Notes
Derived from the Interim Administrative Procedures for National Parks issued by the National Forestry and Grassland Administration of the People’s Republic of China and the Regulations of the People’s Republic of China on Nature Reserves issued by the State Council of the People’s Republic of China.
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We would also like to express our gratitude to the anonymous reviewers and editor. Any remaining errors are solely our own.
Funding
This research is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (72103196, 71861147001), National Social Science Fund of China (21ZDA090), China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (2021M703563), and Chinese Scholarship Council (201806360261).
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ZD: conceptualization; formal analysis; investigation; writing—original draft. YH: review and editing; investigation. SK: conceptualization; review and editing. BM: conceptualization; project administration; investigation; writing—review and editing. All authors read and contributed to the manuscript.
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Appendices
Appendix 1 Measurement of the principal components of risk perception
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Appendix 2 Measurement of the risk perception derived from the CFA
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Appendix 3 The bootstrapped standard error from the SEM-PCA model
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Dai, Z., Hou, Y., Kant, S. et al. The influence of China’s protected areas policy on households’ risk perception, forest investment, and revenue. Environ Sci Pollut Res 30, 27799–27814 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-23994-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-23994-7