Collective forest tenure reform and rural consumption inequality in China

This paper investigates whether China’s collective forest tenure reform reduces rural consumption inequality. Using panel data from three survey waves across seven southern and southeastern provinces, we measure intra-village inequality as the absolute deviation of each household’s consumption from the village average and apply inverse probability weighting to correct for sample attrition. Results show that fully transferring forest management rights from collective to household control reduces inequality in daily consumption, housing consumption, and total consumption by 16.0%, 24.3%, and 14.8%, respectively. The reform disproportionately benefits previously disadvantaged households by im proving access to forest resources, expanding income-generating opportunities, and reducing reliance on collective decision-making, thereby narrowing intra-village disparities. These findings provide new evidence that decentralizing land tenure can enhance rural equity and offer policy implications for forest-rich developing countries seeking to promote both social stability and inclusive rural development through tenure reforms.