Involuntary Resettlement, Production and Income: Evidence from Xiaolangdi, PRC

World Development Vol. 32, No. 4, pp. 673–690, 2004� 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

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doi:10.1016/j.wor

Involuntary Resettlement, Production and

Income: Evidence from Xiaolangdi, PRC

MICHAEL WEBBER

and

BROOKE MCDONALD *The University of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

Summary. — This paper examines how the capacities of the Chinese state and the institutionalstructure of agriculture have affected the manner in which resettlement has influenced thelivelihoods of peasants in two Henan villages. The villages were resettled because of construction ofthe Xiaolangdi dam on the Yellow River. Although located in the same region, the original villagesexhibited different income levels, equality, and forms of production; since resettlement, incomes inthe poorer village have risen, but in the richer village have fallen. The villagers now have access toless land than formerly (though more of it is irrigated) but many now work in new construction andtransport activities, building the dam and the village infrastructure. In both villages, whenconstruction ceases, incomes are expected to fall.� 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Key words — China, resettlement, dams, villages, Xiaolangdi, impoverishment

*Research for this paper was supported by an ARCSmall Grant in 2000 and ARC grant DP0209563 to

Webber. The field work was conducted by McDonald.

Final revision accepted: 30 October 2003.

1. INTRODUCTION

There has been a long history around theworld of poorly managed resettlement schemesinstigated by dam construction. Probably themajority of resettlements have involved themajority of resettlers in a downward economictrajectory (McCully, 1996). In India alone, 15million of the 21 million people displaced overthe last four decades are worse off than beforeresettlement (Parasuraman, 1999). There hasbeen wide debate in such regions as Scandi-navia over the wisdom of providing aid forconstructing dams in developing countrieswhen so many projects leave behind a ‘‘laby-rinth of broken communities, broken familiesand broken lives . . . beyond numerical calcula-tion’’ (Mathur, 1995, p. 2).No country in the world matches the mag-

nitude of displacement caused by infrastructuredevelopment in China (WCD, 2000). Over 45million people have been resettled since 1949(WCD, 2000). The expansion of cities is thegreatest cause of displacement; even so, 12million people have been displaced by 85,000reservoirs since 1949 (an average of 240,000 per

673

year). China is now building fewer and largerdams than in the Maoist era (WCD, 2000). Fivelarge multipurpose dams have been supportedby World Bank loans since 1985––the Shuikou,Daguangba, Ertan, Jingya and Xiaolangdidams––that have collectively inundated 25,000ha and displaced 343,000 people (WCD, 2000).In the 1990s the Chinese government became

the world’s largest recipient of World Bank aidfor dam construction (Skar & McNully, 1994).Yet there has been remarkably little indepen-dent evidence in English of the impact of Bank-sponsored construction on resettled people(independent that is of the World Bank or theChinese government). Moreover, few of thepublished reports in English rely on carefulsurveys or stated methods. The aim of thispaper therefore is to provide some independentevidence of the impact of involuntary resettle-ment on income and production within rural

WORLD DEVELOPMENT674

households that were resettled because of con-struction of the Xiaolangdi dam, on whichpreparatory work began in September 1991.Specifically, we ask: under what circumstancesdoes resettlement affect people’s levels of pro-duction and the resources they can command toproduce?The question concerns changes in material

production, measured at an individual level.Resettlement can induce changes in individualcapacities to produce (for example, by changingareas and qualities of land holdings) and insocial capacities (for example, by altering gov-ernance structures or cooperative workplaces).It can also influence material well-being(consumption possibilities), access to culturalartifacts (tombs of ancestors, for example),physical health (incidence of disease, forexample), psychological health (stress, forexample), and changes in emotions towardhousing and environment. These are allimportant effects. Nevertheless, it is changes inincome and production that are the focus ofthis paper.We seek to answer this question in the six

sections that follow. We begin in Section 2 bybriefly reviewing some evidence about previ-ous resettlements, before identifying in Sec-tion 3 the policies that were reportedlyfollowed by the World Bank and the PRC inplanning this resettlement. Section 4 providesinformation about the history of the dam’sconstruction and the resettlement program aswell as outlining the methods that we fol-lowed. Section 5 describes the villages beforethey were inundated and Section 6 the villagesas they were in mid-2000 after resettlement.The conclusions about the experiences ofthese people and the practice of planning fortheir futures are drawn together in Section 7in order to answer the question we haveposed.

2. WHAT TO EXPECT

Resettled populations commonly becomeimpoverished after they have been relocated. Inpoorly handled displacements, severe impover-ishment and social disintegration affect manypeople, not simply the immediately affectedpopulation (Cernea, 1996). India’s NarmadaValley Project provides a pertinent example(Fox & Brown, 1998; Hancock, 1989; Mehta,1994; Parasuraman, 1999; Rich, 1994; Schacht,1997; Thukral & Singh, 1995). Approved in

1987 by the Indian Government, the NarmadaValley Project consists of more than 3,000major and minor dams along the NarmadaRiver (Alvares & Billorey, 1988). The projectwas originally funded by the World Bank;however, funds were withdrawn in 1993 afterthe Morse Report highlighted the dam’s socialand environmental impacts (Roy, 1999). Thisproject has caused impoverishment for manycommunities (for discussion see Fox, 1998;Hancock, 1989; Mehta, 1994; Parasuraman,1999; Rich, 1994; Roy, 1999; Schacht, 1997;Thukral & Singh, 1995). Schacht (1997)describes how those displaced find themselvesexiled to ‘‘resettlement ghettos’’ on poor land,far from their former communities.Unfortunately, such examples are replicated

in country after country, project after project.There is no quantitative evidence that anyWorld Bank-financed dam construction inLatin America has adequately rehabilitated theresettled people, in terms of income, health orother social welfare measures (Wilks & Hild-yard, 1994; see, too, Ribeiro, 1994). Roder(1994) on Nigeria, Elder (1976) on Nepal,Wilks and Hildyard (1994) and McCully (1996)on Thailand continue the story. Even theWorld Bank (1994c) admits that during 1986–93, more people were unsatisfactorily thansatisfactorily resettled.There is some indication that the record of

involuntary resettlement in China may be theexception to this pattern of failure. ManyChinese commentators regard resettlementsundertaken since the mid-1980s as smooth andeffective operations that have reflected newpolicies (Tang, 2002). The World Bank’s reviewof projects involving involuntary resettlement1986–93 found that resettlement in China nowgenerally works well and even adds to projectbenefits (World Bank, 1994c). Some however,are more skeptical of resettlement outcomes inChina. Both Stein (1997) and McElroy (1999)observe that involuntary resettlement in Chinaall too frequently implies the abandonmentof those displaced to conditions of chronicimpoverishment. Chau (1995) estimates that30% of China’s involuntary resettlements havefailed. Qing (1989) comments that there are nocases of successful involuntary resettlement inChina. People resettled from the Sanmenxiadam region during 1957–61 still live in relativepoverty, with 90% still living in temporaryshelters 30 years later (Chen, 1991). Residentsin Shandong remain dissatisfied about theeffects of resettlement on them (Croll, 1999a):

INVOLUNTARY RESETTLEMENT 675

‘‘to help the relocatees move was much easierthan helping them to stand on their own twofeet’’ (Croll, 1999a, p. 28).There is, then, confusion over the economic

costs of dislocation in China (Cernea, 1999,2000). In principle, people who are beingresettled face a variety of risks. To understandthese, we need to modify Cernea’s (1997)model of risks, both to reflect the institutionalstructure at Xiaolangdi and to separate causeand effect. The main risks identified by Cerneaare: (a) landlessness; (b) joblessness; (c)homelessness; (d) marginalization; (e) foodinsecurity; (f) loss of access to common prop-erty resources; (g) increased morbidity; and (h)community disarticulation. The resettlementsat Xiaolangdi have been planned as reloca-tions of entire villages, and villagers have beenprovided with the funds with which to con-struct new houses and communal infrastruc-ture: thus homelessness has not occurred.However, people’s capacity to produce maydeteriorate, leading to such observed effects asfood insecurity, marginalization and loss ofincome. That deterioration in turn may origi-nate in causes––the loss of such productiveassets as land, common property resources,jobs, health and community articulation. Croll(1999b) comes to a similar conclusion: themain causes of dissatisfaction in all the villageshe examined were precarious livelihoods,declining standards of living and uncertaintyof production and development, for whichboth villagers and officials held the otherresponsible.According to Mahapatra (1999), loss of land

sets the level of impoverishment in involuntarydisplacement.

Expropriation of land removes the main foundationupon which people’s productive systems, commercialactivities and livelihoods are constructed. This is theprincipal form of decapitalization and pauperizationof displaced people as they lose both physical andman-made capital (Cernea, 1997, p. 1572).

Casual field observation in Chinese villagessuggests that the relationship between farmersand land remains close, especially where thereare few economic activities that are not basedon land; for all farmers, the presence of acces-sible land continues to be of both practical andsymbolic importance in ensuring potential orlong-term security.In China, the development of production––

with its goals of maintaining and improving

villager’s incomes––caused the most adminis-trative stress and the most hardship amongresettled populations (Mahapatra, 1999). Pro-duction has been difficult to develop, not onlybecause villages were frequently located inremote and inhospitable resource-scarce moun-tain regions, but also because relocation anddevelopment are insufficiently linked, in con-cept and practice. In China, these phases arestill regarded as separate and sequential ratherthan as overlapping or interlinked; frequentlyplanning and preparation for production anddevelopment at the time of relocation areinsufficient (Croll, 1999b).The risk of joblessness is also high. The

construction of a dam and the reconstruction ofa village lead to a temporary boom inemployment. But employment ‘‘severely dropstoward the end of the project. This compoundsthe incidence of chronic and temporary job-lessness among the displaced population’’(Cernea, 2000, p. 25). ‘‘Joblessness among re-settlers often surfaces after a time delay, ratherthan immediately, because in the short run theymay receive employment in project relatedjobs’’ (Cernea, 1997, p. 1573).

When people are forcibly displaced, production sys-tems are dismantled. Many jobs, much valuable landand other income generating assets are lost . . . Andnot only the affected people are worse off: when dis-placement is massive, it also weakens the local and re-gional economy (Cernea, 1996, p. 46). 1

These, then, are the central risks towhich––according to current knowledge––thevillagers have been exposed. Food insecurity,marginalization and loss of income are theprincipal measures of productive capacity invillages; and we explicitly measure them.These effects may arise because of changes inland resources (including common propertyresources), jobs, health and community orga-nization. In a country such as China, whereland is so scarce and yet agriculture so fun-damental to people’s lives, the inundation ofeven small areas of arable land must signify areduction in rural resources (both privatelymanaged and common property). When fac-tories and other sources of off-farm work arelost to a dam’s effects, then the villagers alsoface the risk of losing potential income. It ispossible that people’s health status maychange and that the move may disrupt theability of the village to operate as a produc-tive unit.


3. POLICY: THE PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OFCHINA AND THE WORLD BANK

The total cost of constructing the dam wasestimated to be 2,866 million RMB, of whichresettlement will account for about one-fifth(The World Bank, 1994a). The project has beenpartly financed by the World Bank; the agree-ment was signed in June 1991 (YRWHDC,1997). One-tenth of the resettlement budget hasbeen donated by The World Bank––about57.13 million RMB (YVWRP, 1999). In addi-tion, financial aid has been provided by the StatePlanning Commission, Ministry of Finance,Bank of Reconstruction, Bank of Developmentand Henan/Shanxi Governments (YRWHDC,1997). The policies that have informed theplanning of this resettlement are thus those ofthe PRC and the World Bank.The World Bank first formulated policy

about involuntary resettlement in 1980. But,practice in Bank-sponsored projects has laggedfar behind policy: Rumansara (1998) provides acogent example of the struggle of local villagersand international nongovernmental organiza-tions (NGOs) against blatant violations ofWorld Bank policy in Kedung Ombo (Indo-nesia). Indeed, Caufield (1996) and Rich (1994)claim that the greening of World Bank policieshas been largely a fac�ade. After a deal of suchexternal criticism (reviewed by Covey, 1998 andWirth, 1998) and (apparently) of internaldebate, the World Bank in the early 1990sreviewed resettlement policies for its dam pro-jects and their implementation (Fox, 1998).After a detailed evaluation, Fox and Brown(1998) conclude that there has been a small butsignificant strengthening of World Bank policy.The current World Bank Operational Manual,Operational Directive 4.30 states that resettle-ment should be conceived as a ‘‘developmentproject’’ with resettlers provided sufficientinvestment and opportunities to share in pro-ject benefits. Particular attention should bepaid to the needs of the poorest. Indigenouspeople, ethnic minorities, pastoralists, andother groups that may have customary rights toland or other resources taken for the project,must be provided with adequate land, infra-structure, and other compensation. Communityparticipation should be encouraged and reset-tlers should be integrated socially and eco-nomically into host communities. The Directiveidentifies specific steps to plan resettlement tomeet these aims. For the first time in any majordam project, the World Bank set aside a fund

specifically to pay for the resettlement of vil-lagers affected by Xiaolangdi.PRC policies give the government overall

responsibility for all resettlement. The govern-ment aims to encourage self-reliance among theresettled populations and to restore theiroriginal living standards.

Compensation and assistance before resettlement, andsupport for production after resettlement are providedas the displaced persons’ needs require and to the ex-tent that national resources permit in order to enablethe displaced persons’ livelihood reach or exceed theformer level (Zeng, 1994, p. 59).

The government should compensate andprovide employment to affected people if noland is available. Displaced farmers should beallowed to resettle on land. In addition, thePRC has adopted special policies for theXiaolangdi project, including aims to improveinfrastructure, to use the revenue from powergeneration to rehabilitate affected people and toinvest tax revenues for the welfare of theresettled people (Yao, 1994).Such intentions do not necessarily translate

into good practice. Clark (1999) provides anexample of the manner in which both WorldBank and Chinese government policies havebeen flouted to speed up the resettlement ofHan farmers in Qinghai. Nor are the policieswithout their flaws (how is a net reduction inagricultural land to be made compatible withimproved living standards?). Yet this study ofresettlement at Xiaolangdi is an evaluation ofoutcomes under policy conditions as good asare to be found anywhere. Resettled people inother projects may well fare worse than thepeople whose villages were inundated by theXiaolangdi reservoir.

4. THE XIAOLANGDI EXAMPLE

The Xiaolangdi project consists of a dam,flood release structures and power facilities onthe middle reaches of the Yellow River (HuangHe) (YRWHDC, 1997). It is located where theYellow River leaves the Loess Plateau andenters the North China Plain, about 40 kmnorth of Luoyang City, 130 km downstream ofSanmenxia Dam and 128 km upstream ofHuayuankou in Zhengzhou City (YRWHDC,1997). Figure 1 illustrates the locations of thedam and the sample villages.

Mengxia

Wenxian

Xingyang

Gongxian

Yanshi

Mengjin

Luoyangshi

XinanMianchi

Shanxian Henan

Sanmenxiashi

Pinglu

Xiaxian

N

International boundaryProvince boundariesYellow River Basin

Beijing

Yuanqu

12

3

4

1 Baigou village - before resettlement2 Dongpo village - before resettlement3 Baigou village - after resettlement4 Dongpo village - after resettlement

0 20 km

Jiyuan

XiaolangdiDam

Wuzhi

Figure 1. Location of Xiaolangdi dam and resettled villages that were sampled.


Major work began in September 1994 (YR-WHDC, 1997). A total of 174 villages in fiveHenan counties (Jiyuan, Mengjin, Xin’an, Mi-anchi and Shanxian) and three Shanxi counties(Yuanqu, Xiaxian and Pinglu) have to beresettled (YRWHDC Resettlement Office,1999). The total population directly affected bythe Xiaolangdi project is 181,050 (World Bank,1994b). The reservoir covers 12 township gov-ernment seats, 182 administrative villages and787 mines/industries (YRWHDC ResettlementOffice, 1999). The actual resettlement will takeplace over 18 years. People will be moved out infour phases, depending on the elevation of theirhomes. In the early stages (to 1996), villagesbelow the dam were resettled (about 31,500people). The third stage (1997–2000) witnessedthe resettlement of the bulk of those affected bythe project––131,500 people––who had lived athigher elevations. In the subsequent decade (to2011), as the dam fills, another 17,900 peoplewill have to be relocated.Two villages were surveyed, Baigou and

Dongpo, both in Jiyuan county, Henan. Henanis a large, relatively poor province. It had in1999 an estimated population of nearly 94million people, 82.5% of whom were ruraldwellers (numbers in this paragraph are fromSSB, 2000). Its annual per capita income of1948 RMB was only 88% of the Chinese aver-

age. 2 The relative poverty of rural householdsin Henan arises largely from the lack oflaboring jobs rather than from low incomes inhousehold businesses (mainly farming). In He-nan, cultivated land per household averaged1.54 mu, with another 0.01 mu of hilly land(compared to the China averages of 2.07 and0.47 respectively). The farmland is plantedmainly to wheat and corn (78.3% of the sownarea), with lesser areas planted to oil crops,cotton, peanuts, soybeans and tubers. There aresome 13.5 million cattle in the province, andsmaller numbers of pigs, sheep and goats.The evidence derives from a survey of

households in the two villages, some informaldiscussions with half a dozen households ineach village, discussions with village leadersand the doctor. The survey was a writtenquestionnaire (in Chinese), circulated to about50 households in each village (we sought, butwere not permitted to interview the house-holds). The survey was conducted in 2000, afterpilot work in 1999 and informal contact withthe YRWHDC. Although an attempt wasmade to distribute the survey instrument ran-domly, in practice the village leaders guided thedistribution of the instrument. There is alsosome evidence, detailed in McDonald (2000),that village leaders attempted to rewrite someof the responses to the questionnaire; however,


this could be distinguished by the fact that thealterations were made by a common pen and acommon handwriting.The questionnaire surveyed a variety of the

experiences of the villagers, including theircompensation, the notice given, their involve-ment in planning the move, and their emotionalresponses to the move. In this paper, we employthe responses to questions concerned withpeople’s livelihoods. (Note that there was also achange in people’s assets; most houses in therelocated villages were newer, more modernand larger than the old houses.) The centralquestions that are relevant to the analyses arelisted in Table 1. The empirical strategy was tomeasure the effects of the shift on income,production and marginalization. We alsosought to identify the causes of these effects––people’s access to land, jobs and commonproperty. It proved impossible to measurehealth status and community functioning, sochanges in these causes are inferred rather thanidentified. The categories that were used todenote occupations and sources of income arethose used by the SSB. Since off-farm employ-ment may be important, people living tempo-rarily outside the village were included ashousehold members, if respondents regardedthem as such.In practice, the quality of responses from

residents of Dongpo was far poorer than thosefrom residents of Baigou. In Dongpo, morequestions were not answered; the variances of

Table 1. Relevant portion

Issue

Household Information 1. How many people li

2. How many adults liv

3. What sex are the ad

4. How many are work

Income 1. How much total inc

2. What types of work

3. What percentage doe

Production 1. How many mu of la

2. What is the yearly a

3. How adequately can

feed this household?

4. What percentage of

dryland agriculture,

5. What percentage of

(question 4) make up

6. How would you rate

aQuestions were asked twice, once for the previous village

some variables were higher; and inspection ofdata indicated that some outliers were in facterrors. Several households ran foul of a com-mon problem, the inconsistency of Chinese andwestern number systems; so some responseswere obviously wrong by a factor of 10 (thesewere corrected).The data are subject to some limitations. A

sample of two villages is not sufficient to gener-alize about the experiences of people resettledbecause of construction of the Xiaolangdi dam.We have not surveyed people who moved totowns or cities. Nor have we surveyed the res-idents of the villages that became host to theresettled farmers. The sample of households isprobably not random. Moreover, there must beerrors in responses––the farmers’ statementsabout life before resettlement reflect memoryand its fallibilities (however, there is no avail-able pre-move survey with which we can com-pare these data).There are too some unavoidable limitations

to our claim that this research is independent ofthe Chinese government and the World Bank.The collection of data was designed, fundedand analyzed independently. But we had tocooperate with the provincial and countyresettlement offices in selecting villages to sur-vey, since permission was required to undertakethe survey. Officials were asked to select onevillage that had been resettled in phase two ofthe scheme and one that was resettled in phasethree, but we were unable to select the specific

s of the questionnairea

Question

ve in this house?

e in this house?

ults?

ing?

ome does this household earn per year?

does this household do?

s each of these types of work contribute to total income?

nd does this household farm?

mount of grain (jin) produced by this household?

the amount of jin produced per year on the farmland

your farmland is used for: (a) irrigated agriculture, (b)

(c) vegetable plots, (d) orchards and (e) fishponds?

your agricultural income does the output of these

?

the quality of your farmland?

and land; once for the new village and land.


villages that satisfied this criterion. We mayhave been steered away from villages in whichresettlement has been disastrous. Furthermore,despite our best efforts, it is probable that vil-lage leaders biased the sample of respondents;however, casual observations in these andsimilar villages confirm the more formal con-clusions that we draw.

5. THE VILLAGES BEFORERESETTLEMENT

(a) General conditions

Baigou was a small, village of 285 house-holds. With an average annual income of only590± 57 RMB per head, it was poorer thanmost of rural Henan (Table 2). 3 Like otherparts of the province, it relied heavily on agri-culture––primarily wheat and corn production,combined with the raising of pigs, goats andother small animals. Households had relativelylittle land––only 1.1 ± 0.05 mu per person, and

Table 2. Characteristics of B

Unit N obs Mean

Persons/household 57 4.1

Adults/household 57 2.4

Income/head RMB 57 590.6

Income/adult RMB 57 1045.0

Income from crops % 56 47.4

Forestry % 56 0.0

Fish % 56 1.1

Animal husbandry % 56 1.8

Small animals % 56 41.0

Nonagriculture % 56 8.7

Land area/household mu 56 4.5

Person mu 56 1.1

Adult mu 56 2.0

Grain output jin 56 2592.9

Yield jin/mu 56 588.2

Land in irrigated

crops

% 56 11.0

Dryland crops % 56 82.9

Vegetables % 56 5.9

Orchards % 55 0.2

Average land quality 52 1.9

Source: Author’s survey, June 2000; calculations by SPSS.aN obs is the number of valid observations for that variableshould be interpreted carefully: most distributions are not

only 11± 6% of that was irrigated cropland. At588± 39 jin/mu, crop yields were significantlybelow the provincial average of 659 jin/mu.Little was grown in the way or fruit or vege-tables. Most households thought that their landwas of inferior quality (on average rating theirland as 1.9 ± 0.2 on a 5-point scale).The village was quite equal in its poverty. As

in most of rural China, land was relativelyequally divided, in Baigou according to thenumber of people per household: the coefficientof variation of farm land per person is only0.17, meaning that about two-thirds of house-holds farmed land an area of land within 17%of the average. (Figure 2 indicates variations inmajor household characteristics.) Equally,incomes were quite equal, with coefficients ofvariation of about 0.3. Virtually all householdsproduced 1,500–3,000 jin of grain.Dongpo was small (426 households), too, but

richer (Table 3 and Figure 2). Its averageincome of 1956± 337 RMB was near the Henanrural average and significantly greater than theaverage in Baigou. Dongpo’s residents relied

aigou before resettlementa

Confidence interval Coefficient of variation

0.30 0.27

0.23 0.37

57.13 0.36

115.66 0.42

3.75 0.29

2.18 7.41

1.08 2.23

5.28 0.48

4.71 2.02

0.33 0.28

0.05 0.17

0.17 0.31

222.54 0.32

38.98 0.25

5.82 1.98

7.78 0.35

5.02 3.17

0.37 6.75

0.24 0.45

. The confidence interval is at 95%. Confidence intervalsnormal.

BAIGOU

0 50 1001

4

7

10Pe

rsons

/ hou

seho

ld

0 50 100

DONGPODONGPODONGPO

0 50 10010

40

70

100

Nona

gricu

ltura

l inco

me (%

)

0 50 100

0 50 1002500

10000

17500

25000

Gra

in o

utpu

t / h

ouse

hold

(jin

)

0 50 100

0 50 100

1

4

Asse

ssed

land

qua

lity

0 50 100

0 50 1001000

4000

7000

10000

Inco

me

/ adu

lt (R

MB)

0 50 100

0 50 1000.75

3

5.25

7.5

Percentage

Land

are

a / a

dult

(mu)

0 20 40 60 80 100Percentage

BeforeAfter

Key

Figure 2. Indicators of household economy, Baigou and Dongpo, before and after resettlement.


Table 3. Characteristics of Dongpo before resettlementa

Unit N obs Mean Confidence interval Coefficient of variation

Persons/household 52 +4.54 0.29 0.23

Adults/household 52 ++3.02 0.39 0.46��

Income/head RMB 49 ++1956.04 337.41 0.60��

Income/adult RMB 49 ++3353.23 694.79 0.72��

Income from crops % 47 )36.83 7.38 0.68��

Forestry % 47 ++11.31 3.16 0.95��

Fish % 47 0.32 0.47 5.07

Animal husbandry % 47 ++8.39 2.50 1.02��

Small animals % 47 ))8.16 2.16 0.90��

Nonagriculture % 47 ++34.99 8.21 0.80��

Land area/household mu 52 5.51 1.00 0.65��

Person mu 52 1.20 0.20 0.59��

Adult mu 52 2.01 0.36 0.64��

Grain output jin 51 ++5612.55 1060.99 0.67��

Yield jin/mu 51 ++1178.34 169.26 0.51��

Land in irrigated crops % 47 ++54.58 9.40 0.59��

Dryland crops % 47 ))33.09 8.67 0.89

Vegetables % 47 6.71 1.28 0.65

Orchards % 47 ++4.35 1.97 1.54��

Fishponds % 46 +1.30 1.01 2.61��

Average land quality 51 ++3.84 0.28 0.27��

Source: Author’s survey, June 2000; calculations by SPSS.a See notes on Table 2. The asterisks (*) attached to the coefficients of variation indicate whether or not, according toLevene’s test, the variances of Dongpo and the Baigou responses are significantly different; * indicating difference atp < 0:05 and ** indicating difference at p < 0:01. The plus (+) and minus ()) signs attached to the means indicatewhether or not the Dongpo and the Baigou responses are significantly different. The tests were independent sample,two-tailed t-tests, assuming equality of variances if Levene’s test did not indicate significantly different variances;otherwise equality of variances was not assumed. ++ or )) indicates a difference that is significant at p < 0:01; + or) indicates a difference that is significant at p < 0:05; + or ++ indicates that the Dongpo means were significantlygreater than those at Baigou; ) or )), indicates that the Dongpo means were significantly lower than those atBaigou.


less on crops and more on forestry, animalhusbandry (cattle) and nonagricultural workthan did the residents of Baigou. While Don-gpo’s residents engaged in many forms ofnonagricultural work, the two principal sourcesof employment were state-owned enterprisesand construction. Even the agricultural econ-omy of Dongpo was more productive than thatof Baigou. Though the areas of land perhousehold, per person or per adult were notsignificantly different, Dongpo’s householdshad access to a high proportion of irrigatedland (55± 9%), far higher than in Baigou.Dongpo’s land was also deemed to be of higherquality. Thus both yields and production perhousehold were significantly higher than inBaigou. Dongpo had orchards and fishponds,providing a variety of food that was absent inBaigou.

Yet, as the coefficients of variation in Table 3and the graphs of Figure 2 indicate, Dongpowas also a more unequal society than Baigou.Land was far less equally divided, whether byhousehold, adult or person, and so too weregrain output, yields and incomes; among allthese indicators of well being, the range thatencompassed two-thirds of household was 60–70% of the average. Over one-quarter of Don-gpo’s residents earned over 5,000 RMB peradult, and were well off by the standards ofrural China; yet 20% earned less than 1,000RMB per adult.

(b) Producing grain

In order to understand how the farmers inthe two villages responded to resettlement, we


identify the factors that control their agricul-tural output.In general, household i’s production of grain

per year (Oi) varies according to:

Oi ¼ function of ½Ni;Mui;Qi; PIi�;

where Ni,Mui, Qi and PIi denote respectively thenumber of persons in the household, the area ofland it farms, the assessed quality of the landand the proportion that is irrigated. PI is aninsignificant influence over output and isdropped from the analysis. So the core pro-duction function that is estimated is:

Oi ¼ function of ½Ni;Mui;Qi�: ð1Þ

The two variables Mu and Q are not howeverindependent of other variables that affect themboth. For example, as a matter of policy, thearea of land per household depends at least inpart on the number of persons in the house-hold, modified by the quality of the land and itspotential for irrigation. People’s assessments ofland quality seem to depend on both theamount of irrigated land and area of land perperson. Thus we expect that

Mui ¼ function of ½Ni;Qi;PIi;and other variables�;ð2Þ

Table 4. Regression results: grain output per hous

Variable Baigou

ANOVA SS df MS FRegression 19.36· 106 2 9.68· 106 29.89

Residual 15.54· 106 48 0.32· 106Total 34.90· 106 50

FIT R2 Adj R2 SEE

0.56 0.54 569.0

Equation B SE t pConstant )377.25 398.78 )0.95 0.349

Pred Mu 497.33 67.14 3.92 ��

Pred Q 382.57 97.60 7.41 ��

N –

Source: Author’s survey, 2000; calculations by SPSS.aANOVA (analysis of variance) headings are: SS (sum of(ratio of mean squares), p (probability of observing such a vR2, and SEE (standard error of estimate of the predicted vaThe Equation headings are B (coefficient estimate), SE (staficient estimate to standard error) and p. The predictors in tland farmed per household, predicted by linear regressionhousehold’s land, predicted by ordinal regression, using Eqnhousehold. *** means that p < 0:001.

Qi ¼ function of ½Mui=Ni;PIi;and other variables�:ð3Þ

The other variables include areas set aside forcrops other than grain; proportion of worktime devoted to off-farm activities; livestocknumbers (for example that provide fertilizer);and the like. Equation system (1)–(3) has beenestimated by 2SLS. 4 The results are containedin Table 4 and Figure 3.Both regression equations are highly signifi-

cant, though the predictions for output inBaigou are more precise than those in Dongpo(SEEs: 569.0 compared to 3,032.6; adjusted R2

0.54 compared to 0.40). Grain output perhousehold is in this sense more predictable inBaigou than in Dongpo. In Eqn. (1) for Baigou,however, N is strongly correlated with thepredicted values of both Mu and Q; it is there-fore dropped from the regression equation.(This result may be interpreted to mean that,since labor is abundant, land areas for grainproduction carry with them sufficient labor towork that land adequately.) The estimates forDongpo indicate that the coefficient on N isonly marginally significant.In Baigou, each additional mu of land yiel-

ded 497± 67 jin of grain, if quality is constant.Though the coefficient on land area is slightly

ehold before resettlement, Baigou and Dongpoa

Dongpo

p SS df MS F p�� 281.50· 106 3 93.83· 106 10.20 ��

349.48· 106 38 9.20· 10641

R2 Adj R2 SEE

0.45 0.40 3032.6

B SE t p)8466.75 2991.51 )2.83 0.007

369.85 169.10 2.19 0.035

1805.68 479.39 3.77 0.001

1179.95 598.53 1.97 0.056

squares), df (degrees of freedom), MS (mean square), Falue of F by chance). The FIT statistics are R2, adjustedriable, annual production of grain in jin per household).ndard error of the coefficient estimate), t (ratio of coef-he regression equation are: predicted value of Mu, area ofusing Eqn. (2); predicted value of Q, quality of each. (3); and (for Dongpo only) N , number of persons in the

0

1000

2000

3000

4000

5000

6000

7000

0 2000 4000 6000Predicted output (jin)

Actu

al o

utlp

ut (j

in)

0

4000

8000

12000

16000

0 4000 8000 12000 16000Predicted output (jin)

Actu

al o

utlp

ut (j

in)

BAIGOU BEFORE RESETTLEMENT DONGPO BEFORE RESETTLEMENT

Figure 3. Actual and predicted grain output per household, Baigou (left) and Dongpo (right) before resettlement.


lower in Dongpo (370± 169), it is not signifi-cantly so. That is, productivity per unit area offarmland was not apparently different in thetwo villages. In Baigou, a unit increment ofquality on one mu of land would raise yields ofgrain by 383± 98 jin; in Dongpo by 1,806± 479jin, significantly higher. Of course, there is noreason to suppose that farmers’ evaluations ofquality are consistent between the two villages(whereas the predictability of Q does indicateconsistent evaluations within villages). There issome evidence that labour inputs in Dongpotended to raise yields.Not only do resources (persons per house-

hold, areas of land per household and averagequality of land) differ between the two villages,but so too do their technologies. At their pre-vailing technology (indicated by the regressionequation), a peasant with average resources ofland and quality would produce

Baigou technology :

þ Baigou resources 2; 588 jin;þDongpo resources 3; 832 jin;

Dongpo technology :

þ Baigou resources 1; 466 jin;þDongpo resources 5; 862 jin:

In other words the technologies used in thetwo villages have been adapted to the specificcombinations of resources available in each, soas to make the best use of those resources. Eachproduction function yields more in its ‘‘own’’village. After resettlement, farmers may have tolearn a new technology, best adapted to their

new environments, even if they move to aroughly comparable location.

6. RESETTLING THE VILLAGES

(a) Baigou

Baigou was resettled four years before thesurvey. The village was relocated from amountain valley onto the floodplain of theYellow River. The village was shifted 70 km,from Daiyu to Yaqiao townships, but withinJiyuan county.The villagers from Baigou were resettled with

different levels of resources (Table 5). Theywere given less land (2.4 mu as compared to 4.5mu), though more was irrigated (97% as com-pared to 11%) than before. As would beexpected from the rule for allocating landaccording to the number of adults in a house-hold, land allocations before and after themove are significantly positively correlated(r ¼ þ0:53), though this was partially offset bynegative correlations between proportions ofland irrigated (r ¼ �0:38) and quality of land(r ¼ �0:76) before and after the move. Manyvillagers were provided with work while thedam was being constructed, either as con-struction laborers or in transport. These dif-ferent levels of resources led to a remarkableimprovement in the material lives of the Baigouvillagers (Figure 3).The sources of income changed dramatically.

The share of income provided by crops fellsignificantly, from a little less than one-halfto nearly one-quarter. This reduction in the

Table 5. Characteristics of Baigou after resettlementa

Unit N obs Mean Confidence

interval

Coefficient of

variation

Correlation

with before

Persons/household 57 4.1 0.30 0.27

Adults/household 57 2.4 0.23 0.37

Income/head RMB 55 1126.9++ 156.25 0.50 +0.26

Income/adult RMB 55 1988.9++ 291.14 0.53 +0.38��

Income from crops % 52 24.1)) 4.58 0.66 )0.37��

Forestry % 52 0.0 0.00 0.00 na

Fish % 52 0.0 0.00 0.00 na

Animal husbandry % 52 2.1 2.00 3.39 0.15

Small animals % 52 32.8 5.30 0.52 )0.08Nonagriculture % 52 41.0++ 6.20 0.52 +0.18

Land area/household mu 54 2.4)) 0.22 0.36 +0.53��

Person mu 54 0.59)) 0.04 0.21 )0.08Adult mu 54 1.04)) 0.08 0.28 0.62��

Grain output jin 54 3916.3++ 332.81 0.31 +0.32�

Yield jin/mu 54 1711.6++ 150.71 0.32 )0.64��

Land in irrigated crops % 53 97.0++ 1.56 0.04 )0.38��

Dryland crops % 53 0.6)) 0.65 4.12 )0.16Vegetables % 53 2.5 1.19 1.73 0.30�

Orchards % 52 0.0 0.00 na na

Average land quality 47 4.4++ 0.27 0.21 )0.76��

Source: Author’s survey, June 2000; calculations by SPSS.a See notes on Table 3. The asterisks (*) and plus or minus (+ or )) indicate significance. Two symbols indicatep < 0:01; one symbol indicates p < 0:05. For the means, + or ++ indicates that the mean was significantly greaterafter resettlement than before; ) or )) indicates that the mean was significantly less. The correlation coefficientcompares household values on the statistics before and after resettlement. Tests are paired sample, two-tail t-tests.Between the last year of production at the original Baigou and the year represented by the survey, inflation has beenless than 5%. Deflating current income estimates by this amount does not significantly alter the results of thecomparisons.


proportion of income from crops was com-pensated by an increase in the share of incomeprovided by nonagricultural work, which rosefrom 8.7% to 41.0%. The result was a neardoubling of income per adult, to 1,989± 290RMB per year (still below the provincial aver-age). Despite reduced areas of farmland,improvements in quality and access to irriga-tion led to a substantial increase in both yieldsand total grain output. Grain yields trebled;total grain output increased by 51%.Changes in income per adult can be decom-

posed into their sources:

Increased income

¼ increased crop incomeþ increased other agricultural incomeþ increased nonagricultural income;

þ944 ¼ �16þ 235þ 725:

(Although the share of income from smallanimal production decreased, the amountearned from selling pigs, chickens and the likeincreased.) Although most forms of off farmincome increased after the move, includingincome from state-owned enterprises and res-taurants, the only two sources of income thatincreased significantly were construction andtransport. These two sectors between themaccounted for 518 RMB of the increasedincome per adult. In other words, the resettledfarmers of Baigou were able to increase theiroff-farm income and their income from smallanimals; the increased grain output was diver-ted to feeding small animals rather than directmarketing of the wheat and corn.The determinants of output in the new village

are analyzed in Table 6 and Figure 4. The best

Table 6. Regression results: predicting grain output per household after resettlement, Baigou and Dongpo

Variable Baigou Dongpo

ANOVA SS df MS F p SS df MS F pRegres-

sion

38.40· 106 2 19.20· 106 29.17 ��

Residual 29.62· 106 45 0.66· 106Total 68.02· 106

FIT R2 Adj R2 SEE R2 Adj R2 SEE

0.57 0.55 811.3

Equation B SE t p B SE t pConstant )1809.61 760.11 )2.38 0.022

Pred Mu 944.68 133.07 7.10 ��

Pred Q 581.82 152.24 3.82 ��

N –

Source: Author’s survey, 2000; calculations by SPSS.

Notation as for Table 4. No significant results could be obtained for Dongpo.

0

1000

2000

3000

4000

5000

6000

7000BAIGOU AFTER RESETTLEMENT

0 2000 4000 6000

Actu

al o

utlp

ut (j

in)

Predicted output (jin)

Figure 4. Actual and predicted grain output per house-hold, Baigou after resettlement.


forms of the equation have remained the same,indicating that the farmers’ output is respond-ing to the same set of variables––area of landand its quality. The key coefficients are shownin Table 7.That is, the effect of land area on output is

much the same in the two locations, but quality

Table 7. Output in the new village (key coefficients)

After Before

Quality 944.7 382.6

Area (mu) 581.8 497.3

now has a dramatically increased effect ascompared to before resettlement. The averagequality of land also improved (more irrigation).Thus smaller areas of land were compatiblewith increased grain output, which in turn fedthe small animals that provided a quarter of theincreases in income.Three caveats caution optimism about the

(material) success of resettling Baigou’s farm-ers.First, some indicators of inequality have

increased during the move. Households’ accessto resources exhibits similar levels of variabil-ity: number of adults, area of land per adultand quality of land––all have roughly the samecoefficients of variation before and after themove. Nor is there strong evidence that thosewho were well off were able to exploit the moveto their advantage: households that gainedgood land after the move had poorer landbefore (the correlation of land areas before andafter the resettlement is expected from the rulesof allocating land). Yet the coefficient of vari-ation of income per adult did rise, from 0.42 to0.53.Second, the well-being of some farmers

decreased. Although the average quality of landrose by 2.49 points after resettlement, twofarmers received land of lower quality andanother ten of the same quality (these were25.5% of the sample households). While 13.1%of households increased grain output by over2,500 jin, another 21.4% of households pro-duced less grain than before. On average,income per adult rose by 944 RMB; yet, while


16.4% of farmers increased their income bymore than 2,000 RMB; 10.9% of householdssaw their incomes fall. Some of the farmershave been disadvantaged (marginalized) by therelocation of their village.Finally, Baigou’s new relative prosperity

relies on additional income from constructionand transport activities. Much constructionwork is either at the dam site or rebuilding thevillage; much transport carries workers to thedam site. Thus much of the increased nonag-ricultural income of Baigou’s farmers dependson the construction of the dam and its associ-ated resettlement. To understand what thisdependence implies, we revise incomes forfarmers after the move. For each household, wesubtract income from construction and trans-port (after the move) and add income fromconstruction and transport (before the move).This transformation simulates the effect ofwinding down the work needed to build thedam and rebuild the village. The implicationsare startling. In effect, without employment indam and village construction and transport,mean income per adult would have risen from1,045± 115 RMB to 1,532± 316 RMB, signifi-cantly less than the actual 1,989± 291 RMB.Furthermore, revised household incomes arestrongly correlated with before-move incomes(r ¼ þ0:63). The farmers who were well offhave remained well off; incomes from con-struction and transport have (temporarily)weakened that link.

(b) Resettling Dongpo

Dongpo village was relocated a year beforethe survey. It too was shifted from a mountainvalley onto the plain. The move was only 5 km,from Daiyu to Lilin township, both withinJiyuan county.Life at Dongpo became worse after resettle-

ment. As at Baigou, Dongpo farmers receivedless land than they had previously farmed(1.17± 0.26 mu per adult as compared to2.01± 0.36) and, while the proportion thatcould be irrigated had increased, farmersthought on average that quality had fallen(from 3.84± 0.28 to 3.35± 0.20). Offsetting thisreduction in agricultural resources was anincreased opportunity to work off farms, againon dam and village construction. In contrast tothe experiences at Baigou, however, the new offfarm employment opportunities and the irri-gation did not offset reductions in area orquality (see Figure 2 and Table 8).

All forms of farm income fell significantly.The proportion of income that Dongpo’sfarmers earned from crop production has notchanged significantly; however, the share ofincome from other forms of farm work––for-estry, fishing and the raising of small and largeanimals––did diminish. The significant loss ofnoncrop farm income has made these farmersincreasingly reliant on grain for farm income;yet grain output per household has fallen, from5,612± 1,061 jin to 4,240± 1,157 jin. Sinceaverage yields increased, the principal reasonfor the reduction in output has been the lossof crop land. By contrast, the proportion ofincome derived from nonagricultural activitiesincreased from 35.0 ± 8.21% to 52.5± 9.83%.On average, income per adult did not changesignificantly, though 62.7± 7.4% of farmers lostincome in the transition.The changes in income at Dongpo can be

summarized as:

Increased income

¼ increased crop incomeþ increased other agricultural incomeþ increased nonagricultural income;

�515 ¼ �168� 662þ 305:Since grain output fell, farmers had to con-

sume a larger proportion of their crop at homeand were unable to translate their grain outputinto small and large animal production. Don-gpo’s farmers are trying to farm smaller areasof lower quality than before. Without forestand fishing resources, they lost one source ofnonagricultural income, so that new work inconstruction and transport could not offset theloss of agricultural income.The effects of resettlement on Dongpo’s

peasants were quite different from those on theresidents of Baigou. In both, the area of landper adult for farming was reduced; at Baigou,this was offset by improved quality of land,whereas at Dongpo, quality has fallen. Thus atBaigou output of grain increased but at Don-gpo fell. At Baigou, farmers were able to feedtheir extra grain to animals and so to diversifyfarm incomes. At Dongpo, an increased pro-portion of grain has to be consumed in thehousehold, and there is less left to feed to ani-mals; the sources of farm income thus becameless diverse. In both villages, transport andconstruction at the dam and in the village andprovided new sources of income. But at Don-gpo, where there had previously been many

Table 8. Characteristics of Dongpo after resettlementa

Unit N obs Mean Confidence

interval

Coefficient

of variation

Correlation

with before

Compare

Baigou (t)

Persons/household 52 4.54 0.31 0.23

Adults/household 52 3.02 0.39 0.46

Income/head RMB 44 1728.2 312.15 ��0.59 +0.13 3.54))Income/adult RMB 44 2838.1 570.58 ��0.65 +0.29 2.70))

Income from crops % 40 37.6 8.52 ��0.70 +0.92�� 2.74++

Forestry % 40 2.8)) 2.32 ��2.62 +0.49�� 2.42++

Fish % 40 0.0)) na na na

Animal

husbandry

% 40 2.0)) 1.50 2.35 +0.15 0.09

Small animals % 40 5.2) 2.41 ��1.45 +0.13 9.91++

Nonagriculture % 40 52.5++ 9.83 ��0.58 +0.75�� 1.88

Land area/

household

mu 51 3.12) 0.26 �0.29 +0.41�� 4.30))

Person mu 51 0.69)) 0.05 0.25 +0.47�� 3.22))Adult mu 51 1.17)) 0.14 �0.40 +0.23 1.63

Grain output jin 50 4240.0) 1156.97 ��0.95 +0.30� 0.55

Yield jin/mu 49 1490.3 504.53 1.16 +0.30� 0.96

Land irrigated

crops

% 43 89.6++ 6.67 ��0.24 +0.02 2.19+

Dryland crops % 42 4.6)) 5.51 ��3.80 )0.04 1.48

Vegetables % 43 2.7)) 1.44 1.72 +0.30 0.26

Orchards % 43 2.9 3.21 ��3.54 +0.10 1.85

Fish % 43 0.3 0.35 ��3.86 )0.06 1.70

Average land

quality

49 3.35)) 0.20 �0.21 )0.18 6.89++

a See notes on Table 3. The asterisks (�) and plus or minus (+ or )) indicate significance: two symbols indicatep < 0:01; one symbol indicates p < 0:05. For the means, + or ++ indicates that the mean was significantly greaterafter resettlement than before; ) or )) indicates that the mean was significantly less. The correlation coefficientcompares household values on the statistics before and after resettlement. Dongpo–Baigou t-tests are two inde-pendent sample, two-tailed. The asterisks (�) attached to the coefficients of variation indicate whether or not,according to Levene’s test, the variances of Dongpo and the Baigou responses are significantly different; � indicatingdifference at p < 0:05 and �� indicating difference at p < 0:01. The plus (+) and minus ()) signs attached to the t-statistic for the Baigou–Dongpo responses indicate the significance of differences in the mean; + implies that the meanfor Baigou was high than that for Dongpo; and ) conversely. The tests were independent sample, two-tailed t-tests,assuming equality of variances if Levene’s test did not indicate significantly different variances; otherwise equality ofvariances was not assumed. Between the last year of production at the original Baigou and the year represented bythe survey, inflation has equalled less than 3%. Deflating current income estimates by this amount does not signifi-cantly alter the results of the comparisons.


sources of off-farm employment, the increase innonagricultural income was smaller than atBaigou. Of course, Dongpo’s residents remainbetter off than those of Baigou, but the differ-ence between them has narrowed sharply.These results make critical the prospect that

dam and village construction will provideemployment only in the short term. Theimplications of losing these sources of income

have been calculated for Dongpo’s farmers (asthey were for Baigou’s farmers). If dam andvillage construction and transport are removed(and replaced by nonagricultural incomes priorto resettlement), then incomes would fall byanother 12%, bringing average householdincome down to only 2,480± 714 RMB. (At thetime of the survey, the village governmenthad no plans to replace the state-owned and


collective enterprises that had comprised such alarge part of Dongpo’s economy before thevillage was relocated.)Indeed, there is some evidence of a break-

down in the organization of Dongpo’s ruraleconomy. Householders said that they had noclear plans for re-establishing their livelihoods,but were waiting for a new factory to be built.People wondered about the sustainability oftheir livelihoods and about how they couldreplace the cows they no longer had the spaceto raise. There were wide divisions over thebenefits of the move. These comments arecompatible with the lack of a significantregression equation to predict grain yields.Perhaps the relocation had been too recent toallow people to adjust.

7. CONCLUSIONS

This information reflects changing conditionsin only two villages, containing rather less than2% of the people who have been (or will be)resettled. It relies on the memory of villagers,whose livelihoods have also been affected bydrought in the three years leading up to thesurvey. It refers to times soon after the reset-tlement.Yet the results do indicate the nature of the

economic risks now faced by resettled ruralpeople in China. Despite the capacity of theChinese state to organize this resettlement vil-lage by village and to provide land and mone-tary compensation for loss of assets, theresettlement does put into question the futurematerial well being of these villagers.We have measured two resources––arable

land and jobs. We have observed commonproperty resources and community organiza-tion. Doctors did comment on changes inaggregate health status; while these commentscould not be confirmed by measurement,changes in morbidity would be revealed inproductivity calculations. The net effect ofchanges in these resources has been an increasein average incomes in the poorer village (Bai-gou) and a decrease in average incomes in thericher village (Dongpo). In Baigou, a minorityof households has seen their incomes diminish;in Dongpo, incomes have fallen for themajority.In both villages there is now less land than

before. Since land is owned by the state inChina, the state can guarantee quite equalaccess to land after resettlement; but it cannot

guarantee enough land. In both villages theamount of land available per head fell, thoughthe average quality of land had improved andso had access to irrigation. The changes in farmincome in the two villages thus turned on theability of the farmers to adapt to these changesin amounts and quality of land. In Baigou, thequality had risen and output with it; in Don-gpo, the quality had fallen and output with it.Some households in Dongpo were openlyfearful about future food supplies.The villagers also face the risk of future

joblessness. At the time of the survey, bothvillages gained income from construction andtransport, associated with the building of thedam and the reconstruction of the villages.Apart from these jobs there were few othersources of income. People in Dongpo wereunderemployed and recognized the deteriora-tion in their lives. Unless new forms of off-farmemployment are created in these villages, theywill both witness drops in average income. Yet,at Dongpo, the village leaders appeared quitedisorganized about what was needed and howto obtain it.There has, thirdly, been a loss of space. There

were few common property resources in theoriginal villages (apart from the stream thatprovided the water supply), but there wasenough steep land for some of it to be used forlow-intensity sources of income: forestry, fishand grazing. On the far more densely populatedplains, there is simply insufficient space topermit these forms of activity. Thus several ofthe sources of diversity in people’s incomes(and diets) were lost in the move.Crucially, outcomes were different in the two

villages. Despite the common location of theold villages in the Yellow River valley and ofthe new villages only a few kilometers apart,there were wide differences in incomes, sourcesof income, and farming technologies. Suchdifferences, in the face of common biogeo-graphical and physical conditions, make plan-ning problematic. To a state bureaucracy, thevillages no doubt appeared similar; yet theiroriginal economies were quite different. Andeven though they were given similar resourcesin their new locations, they have responded tothese new conditions quite differently. Equalpolicies have not produced equal effects.China now has far a larger resettlement

scheme in progress, the Three Gorges project.This involves the relocation of 846,200 people(officially), some to places as far away asShanghai (YVWRP, 1999). Our evidence is that


the Chinese state does have the capacity toavoid many of the worst effects of resettlement,at least for villages that are resettled as a wholeto a new rural location. Even so, the state maynot be able to (a) avoid loss of land; (b) insureagainst joblessness; (c) avoid the loss of space

for low-intensity sources of income; and (d)plan in sufficient detail to respond to differentvillage economies. Whether, when whole citiesare moved or when people are moved to quitedifferent social environments, these remain theprincipal risks, is a question for the future.

NOTES

1. Though we lacked permission to talk to the villages

whose land was appropriated to provide for the resettled

villages.

2. Chinese units:1 jin¼ 0.5 kg; 1 mu¼ 0.067 ha; in2000, on average $US 1¼RMB 8.27.

3. Notation: the symbol 590± 57 RMB per head means

that average incomes per head ‘‘probably’’ lie within the

range 590–57 (¼ 533) RMB per head and 590+ 57

(¼ 647) RMB per head. ‘‘Probably’’ means with 95%

certainty.

4. The 2SLS was done ‘‘manually,’’ in the sense that

Eqns. (2) and (3) were first estimated and the predicted

values of Mu and Q used to estimate Eqn. (1). Standard2SLS statistical packages assume that the predictors in

Eqn. (1) are numeric, whereas Q is an ordinal variable.Thus Eqn. (3) was estimated by ordinal regression, using

a logit form. All other equations were estimated by

linear regression and in untransformed, linear form.

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Documents

Involuntary Resettlement, Production and Income: Evidence from Xiaolangdi, PRC