We evaluate the impact of collaborative management agreements (CMAs) designed to protect forests and raise incomes for smallholders living adjacent to Rwenzori Mountains National Park (RMNP), Uganda. We use a quasi-experimental study design to estimate changes in several income measures, as well as land cover using three waves (2003, 2007, and 2012) of household survey and remote sensing data. Overall, we find no significant impact of CMAs on any of our income measures. However, when disaggregating households by income quartile, we find that access to forest resources in RMNP may have had an income stabilizing effect for poor households. Forest income grew significantly faster among the poorest quartile of treatment relative to control households, partially because poor households recorded very low income from forests at baseline. The effect of CMAs on forest cover is minimal, although we find that conversion of woody savanna and savanna to cropland is more pronounced in villages with CMAs. These findings suggest that in the medium-term, CMAs have failed to deliver conservation or development benefits related to enhancing livelihoods or conserving forests near RMNP. Practitioners should consider different CMA models or other strategies for improving welfare and forest health outcomes in communities neighboring protected areas.

中文翻译：

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寻找乌干达鲁文佐里山国家公园社区管理协议的中期保护和发展影响

我们评估了旨在保护森林并提高乌干达鲁文佐里山国家公园 (RMNP) 附近小农收入的合作管理协议 (CMA) 的影响。我们使用准实验研究设计，使用三波（2003 年、2007 年和 2012 年）的住户调查和遥感数据来估计若干收入措施和土地覆盖的变化。总体而言，我们发现 CMA 对我们的任何收入指标都没有重大影响。然而，当按收入四分位数对家庭进行分类时，我们发现在 RMNP 中获取森林资源可能对贫困家庭具有稳定收入的作用。与对照家庭相比，最贫困的四分之一治疗组的森林收入增长明显更快，部分原因是贫困家庭在基线时的森林收入非常低。CMA 对森林覆盖的影响很小，尽管我们发现在有 CMA 的村庄中，木质稀树草原和稀树草原向农田的转化更为明显。这些调查结果表明，从中期来看，CMA 未能提供与改善生计或保护 RMNP 附近森林相关的保护或发展效益。从业者应考虑不同的 CMA 模型或其他策略，以改善邻近保护区社区的福利和森林健康结果。