Pasture taxes and agricultural intensification in southern Mali
结合生物物理模拟与农户模型,研究马里苏丹-几内亚地区15年间牧场税对农户从自由放牧转向集约化圈养的影响,发现低额税收即可促进集约化并提升社区福利。
This study integrates biophysical simulation data with a farm household model of intertemporal optimization, to investigate changing crop-livestock management practices in the Sudano-Guinean zone of Mali. Over a 15-yr time horizon we find that free grazing on the commons remains more attractive to the representative household than adopting more labor- and capitalintensive confinement systems, but that a relatively low level of pasture tax (around US$3 per livestock unit per year) would be sufficient to induce intensification. Because confinement raises output, the net cost of the tax to the household is only about US$1 per unit per year. Imposing pasture taxes to induce intensification could raise community welfare, if the value of commons resources liberated by reduced grazing pressure exceeds that level. © 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.