China Agricultural Policy Research Center, Peking University China Agricultural Policy Research Center, Peking University

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New Paper published by Jinxia Wang and coauthors at Water Resources Research
Assessing the impacts of fiscal reforms on investment in village-level irrigation infrastructure

Christine E. Boyle, Qiuqiong Huang, and Jinxia Wang

Abstract: This paper investigates investment trends into village-level irrigation projects and assesses the impact of fiscal reforms including the tax-for-fee reform and the elimination of agricultural tax on irrigation investment. The China Water Institutions and Management Panel Survey data show that village leaders, water user associations, farmers, and upper level governments have all contributed to irrigation investment in villages throughout the study period between 1996 and 2007. Both descriptive and multivariate analyses suggest that changes brought by fiscal reforms have significantly reduced village collectives’ capacity to fund irrigation infrastructure in villages. There was a significant drop in upper level government investment during the posttax-for-fee period (2002–2004 in the sample areas). Since 2005, upper level government has increased its investment to prereform levels and partly filled the public investment void in irrigation infrastructure. Fiscal reforms had the least impact on farmers’ investment, which has been the most stable source of funding for village-level irrigation projects.

Download File:Boyleetal_WRRAug2014.pdf
  • Boyleetal_WRRAug2014.pdf