The Policy Of Completely Stopping Commercial Logging Of Natural Forests On Farmers’ Well-being In Forest Areas

In 1998,the CPC Central Committee and the State Council launched and implemented the natural forest resources protection project in the upper reaches of the Yangtze River,the upper and middle reaches of the Yellow River,Northeast China,Inner Mongolia and other key state-owned forest areas,marking the transformation of China’s forestry from focusing on wood production to focusing on ecological construction.This is a major decision made by the state to restore forest resources,build a complete forest ecosystem and ensure land ecological security.Especially since the 18 th National Congress of the Communist Party of China,the protection of natural forests has been strengthened,and the commercial logging of natural forests has been stopped.China’s forest resources have achieved "double growth" in area and accumulation,continuously improved the service function of forest ecosystem,and produced huge ecological benefits.However,the policy of cutting off natural forest has had a significant impact on the livelihood of farmers in forest areas,resulting in the cutting off of the original livelihood dependence path and the realization of livelihood transformation and development.The report of the 19 th national congress pointed out that "improving people’s livelihood and well-being is the fundamental purpose of development".Whether to realize the "win-win" pattern of increasing ecosystem service functions and continuously improving the well-being of farmers who stop logging is a long-term strategic issue related to the sustainable development of collective natural forest protection in the south.Therefore,this study explores the impact of commercial logging cessation policy of natural forest on the well-being level of farmers,and the research results provide suggestions and Countermeasures for the government to formulate the next step of farmers’ transformation and development policy and improve the well-being level of farmers.As an important means of protecting natural forest resources,the policy of stopping cutting of natural forest has had a profound impact on the production and life of farmers in forest areas,and then affected the well-being level of farmers.This paper attempts to answer three questions: first,by constructing a multi-dimensional well-being index system,this paper investigates the changes of well-being of forest farmers before and after the cessation of natural forest cutting,and summarizes and analyzes the multi-dimensional well-being level and each dimension of well-being level of forest farmers;The second is the impact of natural forest cutting cessation on single well-being and its mechanism,as well as whether there is a heterogeneous impact,and further verify whether there is an "Easterlin" paradox between household per capita income and subjective well-being in forest areas under the impact of natural forest cutting cessation policy.Third,the impact and mechanism of natural forest cutting cessation on the multi-dimensional well-being level of farmers in forest areas,as well as its heterogeneity results,and further investigate the impact of cutting cessation scope on the well-being level of farmers in forest areas.The results show that: first,on the whole,the natural forest cutting cessation has a significant negative impact on the per capita income of families,which is not conducive to the increase of per capita income of families,but the natural forest cutting cessation policy has a significant positive impact on the subjective well-being and can improve the subjective well-being level of farmers;Natural forest cutting cessation has a significant positive impact on the multi-dimensional well-being of farmers in forest areas,and can promote the improvement of the multi-dimensional well-being of farmers.Natural forest cutting cessation policy has a significant positive effect on the well-being of farmers in the two dimensions of safety and health and ecology and environment,and improves the well-being of farmers in the dimensions of safety and health and ecology and environment;It has a significant negative impact on the well-being level of farmers’ basic life and services and family neighborhood relations.Second,the heterogeneity results show that compared with farmers with large forest land scale,the impact of natural forest cutting cessation policy on small-scale forestry households is more significant,and the effect of natural forest cutting cessation on household per capita income and subjective well-being is more obvious.For the multi-dimensional well-being,quantile regression was used to verify the heterogeneity.The natural forest cutting cessation policy had a positive significant effect on the multi-dimensional well-being level of forest farmers at the statistical level of 5%.At the same time,compared with farmers whose household head occupation is related to forestry,the impact of natural forest cutting cessation policy on the multidimensional well-being level of farmers whose household head occupation is not related to forestry is more significant;Moreover,compared with the farmers whose heads of households are village cadres,the impact of natural forest cutting cessation policy on the multidimensional well-being level of non village cadre farmers’ families is more significant.Third,the natural forest cutting cessation policy has a single threshold for the subjective well-being of forest farmers.When the logarithm of household per capita income is less than the threshold value,the increase of household per capita income in this range has an obvious incentive effect on the subjective well-being of forest farmers.In the verification of the multi-dimensional well-being of farmers in the scope of natural forest cutting cessation,the larger the scope of natural forest cutting cessation has a significant positive impact on the multi-dimensional well-being level of farmers in forest areas,the well-being level of safety and health dimensions,and the well-being level of ecology and environment dimensions.In terms of the degree of improvement,every additional unit in the scope of stopping logging will increase the multi-dimensional well-being level of farmers by 9.6%,1.7% in the dimension of safety and health,and 1.8% in the dimension of ecology and environment.Based on the above research results,the following enlightenment is obtained:(1)Build and improve the supporting system of employment skills training for farmers in forest areas,give full play to the promoting effect of cutting cessation policy on Farmers’ livelihood differentiation,and realize the diversified development of farmers’ livelihood;(2)Actively guide forest farmers to adopt multi-channel employment to improve their ability to resist policy shocks;(3)Accelerate the promotion of industrial layout in forest areas and create the development of advantageous industries;(4)Consolidate and improve the achievements of forest ecosystem services,make the natural ecosystem have a good development trend,and provide opportunities for the development of ecotourism and ecological health industry in forest areas.