Effects of key state-owned forestry reforms on the inequality of household incomes

Based on the survey on 1 454 households in 24 forestry bureaus in 3 provinces, this paper used both MEL and OLS methods to evaluate the impact of state-owned forestry reforms on the inequality of household income. The study found that inequality of households in state-owned forestry regions has further aggravated and the reforms take the main responsibility for this phenomenon. The household income gap would increase 8 yuan with one more year of the implementation of market-oriented forestry production; The household income gap would increase 13 yuan with one percentage up in the households who participated in contracted forest management and protection; The household income gap would increase 2 yuan with every one percentage up in the change of forest enterprises ownership; One-time settlement also had a significant effect on growing households’ income gap while pension burden has a significant effect on reducing households' income gap. Therefore, in the process of pushing the market-oriented reform to improve the efficiency, the government needs to introduce corresponding supporting policies, in particular, to support and help the vulnerable groups in order to avoid the increase of inequality.