Innovation in natural resource management: the role of property rights and collective action in developing countries

The institutions of property rights and collective action affect how people manage natural resources. Together, they shape people's incentives for undertaking sustainable and productive management strategies and influence who benefits from natural resources and how much. A better understanding of the linkages between property rights, collective action, and natural resource management is important because these linkages have implications for the adoption of innovative technologies and practices, economic growth, equity and poverty alleviation, and environmental sustainability. Secure property rights (to give people long-term incentives) and collective action (to coordinate individuals' actions) have become particularly relevant for international agricultural research as it expands beyond agricultural technologies that can be employed on individual farms to natural resource management techniques that operate at the landscape level. Many centers in the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) have been grappling with these issues. Because there are few rigorous, cross-comparable case studies of these institutions, researchers have had difficulty developing locally relevant policy recommendations and internationally generalizable lessons that can help focus government activities and create an enabling environment for local-level efforts. In response to this need for better understanding, the CGIAR has begun a Systemwide Program on Collective Action and Property Rights (CAPRi) to promote comparative research on the role played by these institutions in shaping the efficiency, sustainability, and equity of natural resource systems.

---

• View source