Institutional Environments,Land Tenure Security And Household Income

Xinjiang is the biggest cotton producer throughout China,providing a substantial share of the farming households' net incomes.Yet the contribution of cotton production has proven to be limited in income improvement due to water scarcity and its induced salinization.To eliminate poverty and improve ecoenvironment,Xinjiang Uyghur autonomous region government proposed to implement fruit and forest tree planting program in late 2004,by introducing fruit trees to crop planting,with the aim of improving water and land utilization efficiency and accelerating farmers' income.To encourage farmers' participation,provisional together with other varied governments provide with farmers free young trees,fertilizer,technical supports,as well as giving priority use of irrigation water.The past decade witnessed fast extension of fruit development,the area of which increased from 347923 hectares in 2006 to 660226 hectares in 2012.The practice of crop-tree intercropping refers to the integration of both trees and crops on a land.Available literature shows that it is considered an alternative innovation of traditional planting system,and is prevailingly used as an important strategy of income and ecological improvement in many developing countries.However,due to its long-term life cycle of tree growing,the fulfillment of expected efficiency is slow.The practice of crop-tree intercropping is considered a long-term land investment with substantial risks on future outcomes,while also representing a lasting change of land use.Its implementation is often hindered by insufficient institutional environments.Therefore,there is low adoption rate and/or rapid abandonment after initial participation in many regions of the world.In our research area,it is interesting to discover that farmers show different participation rate on different land types(including contract land and wasteland).Empirical results indicate that land tenure security particularly the perception perspective is one of the most important determinants of farmers' intercropping participation.Moreover,its specific effects on farmers' intercropping decision-making may be location-specific for different agro-forestry practices.Relatively limited empirical attention has been paid to the role of land tenure security and insecurity in these decisions.Understanding the precise relations between land tenure security particularly its perception perspect and the adoption of specific intercropping practices is of crucial importance,because it facilitates to a better practical implementation efficiency for three reasons.First,either the legal or de factal tenure security fulfills its efficiency via the perception perspective.Second,land tenure security plays a crucial role in inducing individual efforts and indirectly impact agricultural efficiency as well as farmers' participation enthusiasm.To extend the development of intercropping and make it as a sustainable long-lasting income generation mechanism for farmers' incomes,a sufficient institutional environment is necessary,because inefficient institutional environments are usually the main obstacles in practical implementation process.Furthermore,available guidance for farmers' economic behaviors is also necessary,because farmers are the terminal participants in final intercropping practice,and their decisions determine the use efficiency of water and land resource use.Therefore,investigation for the influence mechanism of land tenure security on farmers' intercropping decisions under specific institutional settings from institution perspective is of both practical and theoretical significance.Given Xinjiang is a minority-mixed province,with most Uyghurs locating,this unique cultural environments provides an excellent insights to look at and compare the impacts of different institutions on land tenure security perceptions.Meanwhile,small farmers in Xinjiang hold two types of farmland,namely contract land and wasteland,which represent two typical tenure regimes,and are related tenure arrangements in rural Xinjiang,thus providing important comparative insights into the effects of land tenure(in)security on intercropping decision-making.This study therefore focuses on the case of intercropping project in Awati County,Akesu district in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous region.It follows the logic rationale of "institutional arrangement-institutional impact-institutional efficiency" and constructs an "institutional environment-land tenure security-farmers' income" theoretical framework.The data applied in this analysis is obtained from household survey data,which is comprised of 352 households from three townships and nine villages.Of which,276 households are single-contract land-holders,with the remaining being double-landholders(namely,contract land and wasteland).The aim of the current paper is to contribute to a better implementation of intercropping,and provide useful practical reference for improvement of ecological environment and rural poverty elimination.Oriented by the main objectives aforementioned,this analysis firstly attempts to detect and compare how the formal institutions and informal tenure arrangements,in particular the use of contracts and the issuing of land certificates,as well as morality relevant trust shape local smallholders' "perceived" land tenure security on both contract land and wasteland.Three interesting findings are reported from the ordered logit regression results.Firstly,the influencing factors of perceived tenure security regarding contract land differentiate from those for wasteland due to different ways of land reclamation and occupation.Secondly,land document variable is not significant in two models.In contrast,trusts under informal tenure settings are seen as helpful by respondents,in particular for wasteland use.Results above indicate that legal tenure institutions do not significantly contribute to the enhancement of the perceived tenure security on the two land types.Land tenure security perception relies more on trust under informal settings.Secondly,this paper attempts to empirically examine the relation between land tenure and intercropping decisions,based on a comparative analysis between contract land and wasteland holders.Regression results from probit model demonstrated that to farmers with two-type land holdings,the perceived land tenure security is positively related with the intercropping adoption possibility on contract land but is negative on wasteland.This indicates that farmers with secured contract land tenure are more likely to adopt contract land intercropping for a livelihood guarantee purpose;while with insecure wasteland tenure security tend to adopt intercropping on wasteland.These findings demonstrate the assurance effect of contract land tenure security on intercropping decision,and the tenure security effect of intercropping on wasteland tenure security perception.Intercropping trees on wasteland may therefore be a strategy for coping with potential land tenure securities.Finally,it attempts to quantitatively assess the average treatment effect on the treatment of intercropping program on participants' income,focusing particularly on farming income,off-farm income,livestock income and gross income,by using the propensity score matching technique.Empirical evidences demonstrate that for farmers with only contract land,livestock income per capital significantly decreased by 15562.08 yuan but showed insignificant impact on farming income and off-farm income.Generally,the livestock income as well as gross income decreased by 15562.08 yuan and 21122.54 yuan respectivlty.For farmers with both contract land and wasteland,intercropping displayed different impacts on participants' income.Specifically,contract land-based intercropping increases farmers' off-farm income,but decreases farming income.In contrast,wasteland-based intercropping decreased participants' farming income significantly.In general,intercropping showed positive effect on off-farm income and negative effect on farming income,with a big magnitude of decrease over increase.Consequently,for participants with two types of land,the gross income decreased by 44496.23 yuan.Policy implications are presented finally based on the conclusions drawn above.First,it is necessary to create a sufficient legal tenure system and improve its implementation efficiency.In order to achieve this,the first priority is to specify relevant legal items,so that to eliminate the potentially original threats on secured land tenure.Second,it is necessary to coordinate the conflicts between village level informal land management principles and state land use laws,in order to make the role of village committee in securing tenure more efficient.Furthermore,it is also of great significance to boost the new round of land registration reform by issuing land certificates with necessary of propagandizing the use of land certificate in providing with legal protection for land tenure security via varied medium channels such as broadcast,TV and internet and so forth.Finally,to make fully use of the role of informal arrangements in shaping farmer' tenure security perceptions,by involving farmers into big event decision-making procedures and constructing a trustful foundation between villagers and village cadres as well as other officials and creating a harmonious governmental atmosphere for rural land management.From the intercropping extension perspective,it is firstly a necessary to upgrade the intercropping technique,by strengthening the local implementation mechanism,via introducing professional experts,training relevant technical individuals,improving participation enthusiasm,and providing financial supports.Furthermore,it is necessary to consider establishing an ecological-service based subsidy providing mechanism,so that to protect farmers' basic livelihood from negative impacts in short term.Thirdly to foster new patterns of modernized agricultural production entities and encourage them endeavor more efforts to wasteland explosion and contract land quality improvement relevant investments.Finally,to issue supplement programs in terms of off-farm skill training as well as fruit transaction market.