Socioeconomic outcomes of ecological restoration projects and parallel policies: A case‐study of the agro‐pastoral ecotone in northern China

Abstract

Clarifying the socioeconomic processes and outcomes of ecological restoration projects (ERPs) is important to the ERP's effectiveness or performance. In addition, ERPs are often carried out in parallel with other policies and may have complex and integrated impacts on social-ecological systems. However, few studies have included the impact of such parallel policies in their analysis. Here, the agro-pastoral ecotone in northern China, which contains several national ERPs and grass-based livestock husbandry promotion policies, was used to analyze the socioeconomic outcomes in the context of multi-policies. Specifically, we developed a framework to integrate linkages between multiple ecosystem management policies, livelihood assets, activities, and socioeconomic outcomes and used a structural equation model to distinguish the contributions and pathways of multi-policies to socioeconomic outcomes. Thus, our framework follows the cascading effects of multi-policies from the perspective of rural livelihoods while highlighting the diverse socioeconomic impacts. The results showed that grass-based livestock husbandry and the local economy had a more significant impact on rural income compared to ERPs. However, it is worth noting that the agricultural structure has also changed with the development of grass-based livestock husbandry, which may have a negative feedback effect on the ERP effectiveness. In other words, complementarity and offsetting can occur between ERPs and parallel policies. Our study contributes to a comprehensive understanding of the social-ecological processes and outcomes, thereby providing new methods and insights for future scientific policymaking.

Changed ecosystem stability in response to climate anomalies in the context of ecological restoration projects

“…The productivity of artificial grasslands in the APENC is easily restricted by these environmental factors. Besides, because of the associated costs (Liu, Li, & He, 2008; Liu, Tao, et al, 2008), it is difficult to achieve the complete prohibition of grazing, and livestock husbandry in the APENC mainly involves semistall feeding (Dang et al, 2022a; Dang et al, 2022b). Therefore, the further development of “grass‐based livestock husbandry” will inevitably lead to higher grazing intensities, which will further weaken the ecosystem stability (Ruppert et al, 2015; von Keyserlingk et al, 2021).…”

“…To analyze the feedback effects resulting from the cascading process brought about by multi‐policies in the APENC, we chose socioeconomic variables that are closely related to ERPs and grass‐based livestock husbandry promotion policies. Therefore, we selected rural migration and the proportion of livestock husbandry to represent the socioeconomic factors (Dang et al, 2022a; Dang et al, 2022b). Specifically, the implementation of ERPs includes many PES projects in the form of converting farmland to forest, and the reduction of livelihood assets usually leads farm households to choose other forms of livelihood activities and promote rural migration (Dang et al, 2020; Zhang et al, 2020).…”

“…Specifically, the implementation of ERPs includes many PES projects in the form of converting farmland to forest, and the reduction of livelihood assets usually leads farm households to choose other forms of livelihood activities and promote rural migration (Dang et al, 2020; Zhang et al, 2020). Besides, in recent years, the Chinese Government has promulgated a series of relevant policies to promote the development of grass‐based livestock husbandry in the APENC, which means reducing the cultivated area of food and cash crops and increasing the proportion of artificial forage sown such as silage maize (Dang et al, 2022a). On the one hand, the government hopes to transfer the dependence of traditional livestock husbandry on natural grasslands to artificial grasslands for achieving sustainable development (Bai et al, 2016; Fang et al, 2016; Gao et al, 2020; Yang, Dietz, et al, 2018).…”

“…Under the background of multiple ERP implementations (Dang et al, 2022a), the afforestation area of the APENC reached 1.06 Â 10 5 km 2 from 2002 to 2019 (Figure 1b), occupying 22.6% of the total area. Previous studies found that these ERPs effectively improved regional vegetation coverage and vital ecosystem services (Jiang et al, 2020;Pei et al, 2021).…”

“…Notably, in recent years, the Chinese Government has issued a series of national strategies aimed at improving human well‐being and sustainable development, including many policies and programs aimed at enhancing the attractiveness of rural areas by developing rural industries (Dang et al, 2022a). Therefore, many policies dedicated to improving rural livelihoods are implemented in parallel with ERPs, so‐called policy mixes (Börner et al, 2017), and ignoring these policies may lead to a wrong assessment of the outcomes of ERPs (Andam Kwaw et al, 2010; Wu, Liu, et al, 2021).…”