Forest Preferences & Urbanization Perspective from four Sacred Groves in India’s National Capital Region By David S. Grace Dr. Dean Urban, Advisor Dr. Marc Jeuland, Advisor Masters project submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Masters of Environmental Management degree in the Nicholas School of the Environment Duke University May 2017 Executive Summary Within its institutional setting, the sacred grove is understood as the forested abode of a deity or multiple deities. However, the relationship between the forest and its divine host/s is expressed in many ways, often in ways which seem incompatible to ‘rational-legal’ discourse and policy. Yet, sacred groves are not confined to the most remote geographies or the most mythic theologies. In fact, the sacred grove is entangled in very ‘modern’ ways of thinking, and bureaucratic governance regimes, in places which are experiencing rapid urban growth and cultural change. Thus, the sacred grove is not easily defined, and its relationship to state protection is complicated. The megacity extending from Delhi, India is formally administered as the National Capital Territory, but is even more broadly conceived as the National Capital Region. The sacred groves in this context have become increasingly characterized by urbanization and related culture change. These conditions present rich theoretical opportunities to analyze changes in preferences among residents in the institutional setting of the sacred forest, empirically, and to interpret implications of any such changes in terms of demand for forest conservation as well as continued collective action potential. To accomplish this task, this present study offers a survey of residents (n=198) within four sacred grove sites in the NCR. This study analyzes the sacred grove as a socio-ecological system situated within a wider landscape consisting of non-sacred forest – with the exception of one site – as well as alternate worship sites outside of sacred forests – here called temple sites. These three site types are important markers in the landscape and are associated with differing types of values and are ascribed different magnitudes of importance. The survey approach seeks to characterize willingness to pay (WTP) for visits to these sites to better understand marginal preferences by site type and characteristic. Details are collected on respondent’s actual visits, and Revealed Preference models infer the characteristics of the visitors to each site type. In specifying these characteristics, this study seeks to determine the impact of important cultural evolution variables and urbanization on preference. Cultural evolution proxy variables utilized include education level, percent calories purchased, and primary worship of native deity. A measure of urbanization is provided by classification of ‘urban’ households based on land-use, land-cover classification as built-up environment. Cultural evolution is analyzed in this Indian context, through the theoretical perspective of Sanskritization, which has been proposed as the cause of institutional decline in the sacred grove. My study contributes to this literature by testing for a Sanskritization effect on forest preferences in a landscape perspective, while controlling for important socio-economic variables in addition to distance to sacred grove and travel cost to nearest sacred grove and temple sites. The Revealed Preference models provide evidence of use-values for the sites, describing actual visits, as well as a baseline for non-use values which may be present. However, Stated Preference survey methods are also utilized to better characterize the range of values present for these sites, by offering hypothetical visits which 1) isolate the sacred vs. non-sacred forest effect on preference, controlling for forest characteristics, and 2) derive relative preference for important forest characteristics – size, temple presence, natural or planted quality, extraction level, and distance from home – as well as marginal preferences among these characteristics by observing trade-offs between varying levels of these attributes. The first item is accomplished with a Contingent Valuation (CV) exercise, which first asks WTP questions for non-sacred forest and then offers the hypothetical choice of a sacred forest visit rather than a non-sacred forest visit, in terms of explicitly additional WTP. The second item is accomplished with a Discrete Choice Experiment (DCE) which offers a series of choice tasks to each respondent, who choose one of two forests described by the attributes above specified at varying levels arranged in a blocked fractional factorial design. This study finds greater WTP for sacred forest than non-sacred forest among residents of the setting of the institutional setting of the sacred grove, in both revealed and stated preference measures. However, a trade-off between sacred forest and temple site visits was observed among those of ‘higher’ urbanization and Sanskritization characteristics. Primary worship of a global deity rather than native deity is one predictor of temple preference, which accords with Sanskritization expectations. However, proximity to sacred grove, holding a professional or vocational degree, or living in an urban environment seem to be better predictors. Overall, relative to the other forest characteristics described, the temple appears more important for visit choice by a factor of two. In this marginal preference context, large forest size and zero extraction level appear to be traded off, suggesting some concern regarding the relation of temple preference and forest conservation demand. Yet, the implications of this temple preference may not be antagonistic to conservation motives. Perhaps unexpected to Sanskritization literature, temple preference seems to correspond with conservation-oriented forest preferences for non-sacred forests. These conservation preferences are suggested by a perception of non-sacred forests as more useful for ecosystem services among temple visitors. An increase in non-use values for non-sacred forest may also be evident in the observation of a greater willingness to pay an entrance fee for non-sacred forest by those who do not worship a native deity primarily. Taken together, these suggest a potential increase in perception of non-sacred forest value and a potential willingness to pay for its non-use ecosystem services. The development of these conservationist preferences for non-sacred forests may yield positive collective action results for community forests facing urbanization threats in which land-use is increasingly contested and alternate uses become feasible tradeoffs with the status quo landscape. Sanskritization, as a transfer from local to global deity worship within the tradition of Hinduism, accords with cultural evolution studies on the relation of complex societies and ‘big Gods.’ The enabling and constraining impacts of these changes for collective action within the institutional setting of the sacred grove are considered to lead to two options: 1). a wider cosmological and social world which creates the enabling conditions for multi-scale governance linkages or 2) a shift in the locus of significance from the forest to the temple, suggestive of a transition from commons to open-access land subject to degradation in the absence of enforcement external to the institutional setting of the sacred grove. This study finds evidence in both directions, and recommends further study of collective action in community forest settings sensitive to cultural evolution. Table of Contents: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………I LIST OF ACRONYMS & TRANSLATIONS……………………………..…………………………………………………………II INTRODUCTION…………………………………………………………………………………………………………….……….1 BACKGROUND………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..3 STUDY AREA………………………………………………………………………………………………………………...14 METHODS……………………………………………………………………………………………………….…..……………...21 SURVEY DESIGN ….…………………………………………………………………………………………………….…21 SAMPLING DESIGN ………………………………………………………………………………………………………21 DATA COLLECTION………………………………………………...…………………………………………………….21 DATA EDITING……………………………………………………………………………………………………………...22 MODELLING TECHNIQUE………………………………………………………………………………………………26 Revealed Preferences……………………………………………………………………………………………..27 Stated Preferences…………………………………………….……………………………………………………29 o Contingent Valuation (CV)…………………………………………………………………………..29 o Discrete Choice Experiment (DCE)………….……………………………………………………31 RESULTS…………………………………………………………………………………………………………….….…………….34 Revealed Preferences……………………………………………………………………………………………..34 o Visits to Sacred Forest, Non-Sacred Forest, & Alternate Worship Sites Stated Preferences…………………………………………….……………………………………………………41 o Contingent Valuation (CV)…………………………………………………………………………..41 o Discrete Choice Experiment (DCE)…………….…………………………………………………47 DISCUSSION…………………………………………………………………………………………….……..……………………48 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS…………………………………………………………………………………………………………….61 REFERENCES…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….62 APPENDICIES……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………65 LIST OF ACRONYMS CV – Contingent Valuation DCE – Discrete Choice Experiment CAP – Collective Action Problem SP – Stated Preference RP – Revealed Preference WTP – Willingness to Pay SF – Sacred Forest NSF – Non-Sacred Forest WS – Temple Site, (Worship Site outside of Sacred Forest) HINDI/REGIONAL TRANSLATIONS NCR- National Capital Region, includes Delhi, Faridabad, and Gurgaon in my study area and other areas. Perhaps