Heterogeneous Effects of Skill Training on Rural Livelihoods around Four Biosphere Reserves in China

The growing contradiction between protection and livelihood is a common challenge for most protected areas in developing countries. Skill training is an important way to increase household income and alleviate the dilemma between conservation and development. However, its effects on household income around protected areas have rarely been explored. This paper aims to evaluate the effect of skill training on the income of households around four Biosphere Reserves in China and explore its mechanism. Based on the information collected from 381 households through face-to-face interviews, this study adopted descriptive analysis and multiple regression to yield consistent results. The results showed that agricultural and off-farm skill training had no impact on the total household income. The results from the mechanism analysis found that participation in off-farm skill training had a significant and positive effect on the total income of the households outside protected areas and participation in agricultural training had a positive effect on agricultural income. The findings indicate that the local government and protected area administration should increase the publicity for skill training, enrich the types training, appropriately supply livelihood support projects that reconcile conservation and development, and strengthen the infrastructure development around protected areas to promote off-farm employment and the circulation and sale of agricultural products. However, the impacts of any associated intensification should be carefully monitored.