Evaluación del impacto del Programa Socio Bosque (PSB) en capital social

Abstract

Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES) programs has been discussed to work as a tool to alleviate poverty, while meeting its main objective of providing important environmental services. Social capital and collective action by ecosystem service providers, and the role of common property, have been identified as key factor for the success of programs inpoverty reduction. In particular, social capital and collective action can be key to minimizing transaction costs and influencing equity in the distribution of benefits. The present investigation evaluates the hypothesis that the Socio Bosque Program (PSB) improves the social capital of the participating communities. Through the estimation of counter factual scenarios, the question answered was: What would have happened to the social capital of the participating communities of the PSB if they had decided not to participate in the program? Data from two surveys was used, one at the household level and another at the community level. For the measurement of social capital, an index of social capital was developed by analyzing the main components. The estimation of the causal effect was obtained through the application of mixed methods (parametric and nonparametric).The main result was that the Socio Bosque program had a significant positive impact on the social capital of the households of the communities participating in the program.