Integrating Social Capital into Institutional Analysis of the Guangxi CDM Forest-based Carbon Sequestration Project

Paying developing countries for carbon sequestration is a vital component of climate change mitigation. If appropriately designed, these payments can also transfer income to poor villagers, which can help achieve the goals of long-term sustainability for the carbon sequestration project and of poverty reduction. Using data on reforestation and a survey of village stakeholders, this paper made an assessment whether or not the world's first CDM forest-based carbon sequestration project implemented in China could simultaneously reach its environmental and developmental objectives. Although the Guangxi project is widely heralded as a model CDM project, still less than half of the project land remain unforested at the time of surveys conducted in September of 2007. The survey revealed one major cause to relatively low participation to the carbon project, highlights the important role of social capital in this initiative.