Using incentives to coordinate responses to a system of payments for watershed services: The middle route of South–North Water Transfer Project, China

Abstract

In any scheme of payments for watershed services, the incentive size can directly affect the watershed services which are provided by water-source areas. It is necessary to understand the payments for watershed services in the Middle Route of China's South–North Water Transfer (SNWT) from the perspective of the relations among the central and local governments. The distributions of interests among governments need to be coordinated under the Chinese authoritarian system, which is characterised by a combination of political centralisation and economic decentralisation. This paper analyses the interactions between the central and local governments in water-source areas to determine the watersh..