Cited by 132Conservation, Biodiversity, and Resource ManagementOil Palm Production and SustainabilityForest Management and Policy

‘Naming and shaming for conservation: evidence from the Brazilian Amazon’

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Cisneros, Elías, Zhou, Sophie Lian, Börner, Jan·2015·PLOS ONE

Abstract

Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon has dropped substantially after a peak of over 27 thousand square kilometers in 2004. Starting in 2008, the Brazilian Ministry of the Environment has regularly published blacklists of critical districts with high annual forest loss. Farms in blacklisted districts face additional administrative hurdles to obtain authorization for clearing forests. In this paper we add to the existing literature on evaluating the Brazilian anti-deforestation policies by specifically quantifying the impact of blacklisting on deforestation. We first use spatial matching techniques using a set of covariates that includes official blacklisting criteria to identify control districts. We then explore the effect of blacklisting on change in deforestation in double difference regressions with panel data covering the period from 2002 to 2012. Multiple robustness checks are conducted including an analysis of potential causal mechanisms behind the success of the blacklist. We find that the blacklist has considerably reduced deforestation in the affected districts even after controlling for the potential mechanism effects of field-based enforcement, environmental registration campaigns, and rural credit.

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  • Imperfect insurance and credit constraints are associated with less investment, smaller profits, and limited growth, thus standing as barriers to development in rural areas.

    “Many studies have pointed out that imperfect insurance and credit constraints are associated with less investment, smaller profits, and limited growth, thus standing as barriers to development in rural areas.25”

    From The Effect of Rural Credit on Deforestation: Evidence from the Brazilian Amazon (2020) · cites this paper as [25]

    The Introduction’s forest-policy background discusses restrictions on access to rural credit, and the Discussion considers credit as a possible mechanism affecting deforestation. Neither section links imperfect insurance or credit constraints to lower investment, profits, or growth. Searches for those terms and rural-development effects found no passage addressing the claim. (LLM, conf=0.76)

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Authors
Cisneros, E., Zhou, S. L., & Börner, J.
Affiliations
University of Bonn (DE)
Corresponding author
Cisneros, Elías
Venue
PLOS ONE
Published
2015-09-23
Volume
10
Issue
9
Pages
e0136402
ISSN
1932-6203 (ISSN-L)
OpenAlex
W1907207127
Cited by
132
References
1
Citations by year
2026: 6 · 2025: 6 · 2024: 12 · 2023: 16 · 2022: 12 · 2021: 25 · 2020: 9 · 2019: 16 · 2018: 8 · 2017: 16 · 2016: 5 · 2013: 1
FWCI
7.24
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • PLoS ONE (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • CentAUR (University of Reading) (submittedVersion)
  • RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
  • CGSPace A Repository of Agricultural Research Outputs (Consultative Group for International Agricultural Research) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion)
  • Figshare (submittedVersion, cc-by)
Funders
  • European Commission (DCI-ENV/2011/269-520)
  • Robert Bosch Stiftung (32.5.8043.0012.0)
Topics
  • Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Conservation, Biodiversity, and Resource Management
  • Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Ecology › Oil Palm Production and Sustainability
  • Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Forest Management and Policy
Keywords
deforestation, blacklisting, Brazilian Amazon, forest loss, environmental law enforcement, naming and shaming, rural credit, policy evaluation
MeSH terms
Brazil, Conservation of Natural Resources, Ecosystem, Forests

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