Nils Droste
Associate professor
Decentralization Effects in Ecological Fiscal Transfers : A Bayesian Structural Time Series Analysis for Portugal
Author
Summary, in English
Portugal has a unitary system in which the central government transfers funds to lower government levels for their public functions. In 2007, Portugal introduced Ecological Fiscal Transfers (EFT), where municipalities receive transfers for hosting protected areas (PA). We study whether introducing EFT in Portugal incentivized municipalities to designate PA and has led to a decentralization of conservation decisions. We employ a Bayesian structural time series approach to estimate the effect of introducing EFT in comparison to a simulated counterfactual time series. Quantitative results show a significant increase in the ratio of municipal and national PA designations following Portugal’s EFT introduction—which we infer to be a causal consequence. The analysis furthermore places emphasis on the importance of relevant municipal conservation competencies for the functioning of the instrument. Results have important implications for conservation policy-making in terms of allocating budgets and competencies in multi-level governments.
Publishing year
2018-12-01
Language
English
Pages
1027-1051
Publication/Series
Environmental and Resource Economics
Volume
71
Issue
4
Document type
Journal article
Publisher
Springer
Status
Published
ISBN/ISSN/Other
- ISSN: 0924-6460