Chun-la LIU, Mei XU, Ke-yang ZHOU, Fan-chao ZENG, Zi-ming LIU
Eco-compensation is an important policy of ecological construction and environmental protection in China. Targeted poverty alleviation is also a significant measure to promote regional coordinated development and ensure that impoverished people can get rid of poverty on schedule. There are some coupling points between the two, such as objects, subjects, carriers, standards, ways and means. China has put forward "a set of poverty alleviation through eco-compensation". Many regions, in light of their actual situations, have also carried out relevant works by combining eco-compensation with targeted poverty alleviation. At present, there are some connections and coupling developments between targeted poverty alleviation and eco-compensation in China. The five typical coupling developments are shown in the following. (1) Coupling development between poor population and eco-compensation object. For the poor people with labor capacity, the government will employ them as forest rangers. As for the targets of poverty alleviation, they will be directly included in the scope of preferential policies of eco-compensation funds and receive subsidies under eco-compensation policies. (2) Coupling development between poverty alleviation region and eco-compensation area. In China, most of the poverty-stricken areas, such as concentrated areas with special difficulties, key counties for poverty alleviation and development, and poverty stricken villages, are distributed in ecologically fragile areas whose ecosystems are sensitive and need to be protected. (3) Coupling development between poverty alleviation industry and eco-compensation measure. The local governments guide the poor to realize green transfer of production, help the impoverished villages to adjust and optimize their industrial structure and transform the mode of economic development, train the impoverished households in planting and raising, and help them to develop special industries such as rural forest tourism, famous and special cash crops, farm recreation, and under-forest economy. (4) Coupling development between poverty intensity and eco-compensation standard. In China, we have implemented regional differential compensation policies, such as appropriately raising eco-compensation standards for poverty stricken villages and poor households, raising subsidies for ecological public welfare forests, and increasing the salaries of forest rangers, etc. In some regions, when determining the key poverty alleviation targets, we, in addition to considering poverty factors such as economic income, should also figure out whether these poverty alleviation targets undertake ecological construction tasks, such as ecological public welfare forest protection, and finally determine the corresponding compensation standards based on their ecological contribution. (5) Coupling development between poverty alleviation policy and eco-compensation requirement. In defining the object of poverty alleviation, priority should be given to the impoverished population who bear the task of public forest protection. In the arrangement of poverty alleviation funds and development funds, such as subsidies for returning farmland to forests and subsidies for under-forest economy arranged by various sectors, are preferentially inclined to the poorer households under the same conditions. In the key areas of poverty alleviation, priorities should be given to the fields of ecological environment construction and protection, the ecological industry development, and some other aspects which are closely related to eco-compensation policies. Each has its own connotation and characteristics. In order to further promote the coupling development between targeted poverty alleviation and eco-compensation in China, we can take measures in many aspects, such as strengthening theoretical researches, clearing the direction and focus of coupling, consolidating the public foundation, and innovating the development model.