Research On Waterhead Region Ecological Compensation Mechanism

Over the years, waterhead region puts a lot of manpower, material and financialresources to protect the ecological security and sustainable use of water resources, whichaffected the economic development. River basin ecological compensation as a water sourceprotection of economic means, its purpose is to arouse the ecological building and theprotector’ s enthusiasm, it is a synthesis of water protection that includes conservationbenefit drive mechanism, incentive mechanism and coordination mechanism. Based on thetheory of ecosystem services value, ecological capital theory, public goods theory and theexternality theory, by using the method of questionnaire investigation, case study, gameanalysis, model analysis, etc, this paper conducts an investigation in water ecologicalcompensation mechanism from the perspective of ecological water use, including thedefinition of the main body of the compensation, the determination of standardcompensation, and the right choice of compensation method and countermeasure andproposal.Basin water resources consist of production water, operation water and ecologicalwater. Among these, the ecological water is the part of the water which has the indirect usevalue. Its functions include flood regulation, water storage, climate adjustment, riversediment, environment purification, carbon fixation, providing wildlife habitat (maintainingbio-diversity), etc. As far as the compensation body of the ecological water, for a large basin,compensation body should be a national or a central government, because ecological waterbenefit covers a wide range of areas and the main beneficiaries are complex to define; or amedium-sized or small basin, the specific compensation body may be defined as thedownstream local government, the reason is that ecological water benefit covers a narrowrange of areas. As the main compensation, the downstream government can raise thecompensation funds from the industry, enterprise and groups which benefit from ecologicalwater. Repayment subject mainly refers to water or watershed upstream region. Thatincludes two parts specificly: Firstly, conservationists, such as the persons who protect andmanage the waterhead region, the government of the water resource protection district, thebuilders of the conservation of the rainforest, etc; Secondly, the people who reduce theecological damage, such as enterprises’ implementation of relocation reconstruction (orproduct in the environmentally and friendly way), ecological migrants for the protection ofwaterhead region, loss of opportunity revenue of local governments for the protection of waterhead Region, the opportunity loss of the inhabitant in the waterhead region caused byreturning farmland to forests and so on.According to the ecological protection cost accounting, ecological compensationstandard is determined, and it compensates waterhead with water resources. Basin waterresources consist of production water, operation water and ecological water. In the light ofthe proportion covered by every ecological services value in the total value to determinethe proportion of different water sharing cost for ecological protection, and then to makesure the amount of compensation which the beneficial body bears.The compensation of which production water is based on their consumption of waterresources (water rights), and the operational water is compensated from the surface area(such as water tourism, entertainment, transportation, etc.) and volume (such as electricitygeneration quantity) of the water, or in accordance with its operating income to be charged.The specific standard can be determined by the negotiation. In terms of the demands ofproduction water and operational water are exuberant, and the definition of beneficial bodyis clear, the compensation funds can be paid by the special department or organization, andthen turn to waterhead. As a public good, ecological water is unclear defined, so thepayment is only from each local government along the basin. The compensation ofecological water depends on crossing water quantity, basin area, basin population and thelevel of economic development, which also through the negotiation to confirm the specificcompensation standard and form.This article studies the willingness to pay and payment level for ecologicalcompensation of the Lower Yellow River residents with survey data from ShandongProvince. The result shows that residents of the region have some of the environmentalawareness and willingness to pay for ecological compensation, but most residents think thatthe main body for compensation should be the state. The influence factors of the willingnessto pay and payment level for ecological compensation of residents are different. Theattention degree to ecological environmental issues and sex of residents significantly affecttheir willingness to pay for ecological compensation. The residents’ awareness on theimportance of ecological environment of the Upper Yellow Rive significantly affects theirpayment level for ecological compensation. The common factors that significantly affectingresidents’ willingness to pay and payment level are the knowledge level of protecting theUpper Yellow River ecological environment needs a large number of investments andincome. The annual per capita payment level is334.72Yuan and the total compensationamount is320.64hundred million Yuan in2010. Using survey data from Qinghai Province, this article analyzes the awareness of the Waterhead Yellow River residents about theexising ecological compensation mechanism and the willingness to accept for ecologicalcompensation after the establishment of Sanjiangyuan nature reserve. The result shows thatthe most of the residents of Sanjiangyuan nature reserve view that the government shouldcompensate them. Using questionnaire data, the article calculates the amount of thewillingness to accept for ecological compensation of Sanjiangyuan nature reserve residentsis about annual79.34hundred million Yuan in2011.On the methods and approaches of ecological compensation, in this paper, we study thegame evolutionary processes and the related influence factors between waterhead region anddownstream local government using the dual population evolutionary game theory ofevolutionary game theory. The results show that the cooperation evolution direction isaffected by the punishment, compensation amount, cooperation cost, cost and income of theecological protection. It will promote the realization of cooperation of the mechanism ofecological compensation for the waterhead region by reducing the cooperation cost and theecological protection cost, improving the ecological protection income, and strengtheningpunishment, determining the fair and reasonable compensation amount.Government plays a key role in the construction of ecological compensationmechanism, this thesis put forward suggestions for the establishment and improvementof waterhead region ecological compensation from ecological compensation legislation、supporting policies and publicity, etc. Specifically including, strengthen the legislative workof the ecological compensation; establish and perfect the supporting policies of ecologicalcompensation of the waterhead region; foster waterhead region ecological compensationmarket trading environment; strengthen environmental protection publicity and education;raise public awareness and participation of ecological compensation.