Presented by Marie-Charlotte Buisson, on the 31st of May, 2013, from the Challenge Program on Water and Food, G3.

1. 31 May 2013
Marie-Charlotte Buisson, Arijit Das, Aditi Mukherji
What determines contribution to a common fund for
upkeep of water infrastructures? Evidence from
experimental game in Coastal Bangladesh

2. INTRODUCTION
• Embankments constructed by the Government of Bangladesh (GoB)
across the entire coastal zone in the 1960s and 1970s.
• 1st objective: Protection for tidal surge, flood, natural calamity
• 2nd objective: Increasing agricultural productivity

3. INTRODUCTION
• Operation and maintenance of the infrastructures is the key
challenge to ensure the sustainability of the system.
• GoB requires local communities to organize themselves into
Water Management Organizations (WMOs) and contribute towards
minor maintenance of water infrastructure.
• National Water Policy of 1999 (MoWR, 1999)
• Guidelines for Participatory Water Management, (MoWR, 2001).
RESEARCH PURPOSE
To understand the factors
that help or impede
collection of voluntary
maintenance funds from
members of WMOs.
POLICY PURPOSE
Improve water governance
and the maintenance of the
infrastructure for enhancing
the productive uses of land
and water resources.
 Some communities have been able to come together and collect fund
for maintenance, while majority have not been able to do so. Why?

4. CONTENT
1.Motivation and background
2. Methodology
3. Descriptive statistics
4. Regression analysis and results
5. Concluding remarks, recommendations

5. MOTIVATION AND BACKGROUND
Water policy in Bangladesh
Before 60s
60s – 80s
• Protection by temporary and seasonal earthen.
• Maintenance by the landlords (zamindars).
• Voluntary labour from their tenants.
• Coastal Embankment Project (CEP)
• No mention of participatory water management.
• BWDB ‘khalashis’ responsible for managing and maintaining coastal embankments.
80s
• Involvement of communities in design and implementation of projects introduced.
• Financial contribution towards maintenance not required.
• Late 1980s, entry of LGED in the water sector.
• Community contribution towards maintenance tested for the first time.
• Realization that regular upkeep of infrastructure is the Achilles heel of entire
infrastructure investments.
• GoB enunciated community participation as its core principle of water
management through its NWP (MoWR, 1999) and GPWM (MoWR, 2001).
• Requirement of financial contribution by the community for maintenance.
90s

6. MOTIVATION AND BACKGROUND
Maintenance situation
Perception of the infrastructures condition
• 20% of the households consider the gates as being in good condition.
• 15% of the households consider the canals as being in good condition.
Contributions
• Both for LGED and BWDB data shows that maintenance funds always fall
to answer to the requirements.
• 91% of the household did not contribute to maintain the gates in 2012.
• 95 % of the household did not contribute to maintain the canals in 2012.
0.0
10.0
20.0
30.0
40.0
50.0
60.0
70.0
Very bad canal condition
Very bad gate condition

7. MOTIVATION AND BACKGROUND
Institutional differences
• Theoretical and empirical research shows the importance of institutions in forging
cooperative outcomes (Bardhan, 2005; Agrawal, 2001; North, 1990).
• Importance of institution in sustainable management of common property resources
(Wade, 1988; Ostrom, 1990; Baland and Platteau, 1996).
• Entered the water sector in 1980s, culture
of community participation was already
well entrenched.
• Small Scale Water Resources Sector
Development Project (SSWRDSP), phase I
in 1994, now phases III and IV, funding
support until 2017.
• WMCAs registered with the cooperative
department.
• Communities contribute 4% of the capital
cost of physical infrastructure.
• Maintenance funds , yearly audit
statements.
• NGOs and extension agencies for
implementing community participation
• Declining field presence.
• WMGs or WMAs registered as rural
cooperatives since 2008.
• No contribution of the WMO required at
initial stage.
• Encouragement of the WMO for starting
maintenance fund and collecting
subscriptions.
BWDBLGED

8. METHODOLOGY
Public good game
Purpose of the game
• Designing a fictive situation to reproduce “real life”
• Understanding the determinants of contribution to maintain a public good.
• Understanding the behaviours: from cooperation to free-riding
Sample
• Game played 18 times:
- Polder 3, polder 30, polder 31
- Latabunia, Jabusha, Bagachra-Badurgachra
• 5 players per game  90 players
• 30 rounds per game  2700 decisions

9. • Each player has to decide the allocation of a cash
amount (20, 35/10) among a common fund and
private fund.
• The incentive for contributing in the common
fund is that if the fund reaches a certain
threshold (50 or 95), a payment is added (25 or
75).
• The common pool is then distributed between
the players.
 The rules vary from one session to another to
reflect real life conditions.
METHODOLOGY
Procedure of the game
TREATMENTS C T1 T2 T3 T4
Information No Yes Yes Yes Yes
Initial cash = = = ≠ ≠
Gains distribution = = ≠ = ≠
Threshold 50 50 50 50 50

10. DESCRIPTIVE STATISTICS
Average contribution per round
Control Treatment 1 Treatment 2 Treatment 3 Treatment 4
8
101214
0 5 10 15 20 25
Rounds

11. DESCRIPTIVE STATISTICS
Information effect
Control
No information
Treatment 1
Information
T-test of
differences
(p-value)
Individual variables
Individual contributions 11.448 9.442 (0.000)
Individual gains 26.117 22.702 (0.000)
Group variable
Proportion of rounds with success 0.744 0.533 (0.003)
Contribution standard deviation, within group 5.009 4.174 (0.020)
Control Round 5
No information
Treatment 1
Round 6
Information
Individual variables
Individual contributions 12.277 10.233
Individual gains 27.666 22.488

12. DESCRIPTIVE STATISTICS
Unequal gain distribution effect
Treatment 1
Equal gains distribution
Treatment 2
Proportional gains
distribution
T-test of
differences
(p-value)
Individual variables
Individual contributions 9.442 13.224 (0.000)
Individual gains 22.702 27.842 (0.000)
Group variable
Proportion of rounds with success 0. 533 0.777 (0.000)
Contribution standard deviation,
within group
4.174 4.005 (0.640)
Equal
Endow
ment

13. DESCRIPTIVE STATISTICS
Inequalities in endowments effect
Equal
Endow
ment
Treatment 1
Equal
endowments
Treatment 3
Unequal
endowments
T-test of
differences
(p-value)
Individual variables
Individual contributions 9.442 10.208 (0.156)
Individual gains 22.702 24.602 (0.010)
Group variable
Proportion of rounds with success 0.533 0.611 (0.294)
Amount collected in the collective fund 47.211 51.044 (0.274)
Contribution standard deviation, within group 4.174 8.394 (0.000)

14. REGRESSION ANALYSIS
Model
Equal
Endow
ment
Individual contribution
Individual earning
Round characteristics
• Game-rules variables
• Past events from the game
(success, contributions, earning)
Group characteristics
• Number of relatives and
friends
• Heterogeneity of the group
(sex, religion, wealth)
• Institutional context
Individual characteristics
• Age, sex, religion
• Level of education
• Main source of income, land size
• Participation and contribution
• Model estimated by OLS
• Clustering at individual level for taking
care of unobserved characteristics of
the individual.

15. REGRESSION ANALYSIS
Estimation strategy
Equal
Endow
ment
Robustness
Panel analysis, with individual fixed effects
Consistency of the results
Learning effect
Each player learns from the game, from the group he plays with and this
learning also depend from his own background.
• Individual, group level
• age, sex, education
• clustering at individual level
• Game level:
• continuous variable, number of round already played by the member
• Game events from the 2 previous rounds: contribution, earning, failure

16. REGRESSION ANALYSIS
Game variables - Results
Equal
Endow
ment
VARIABLES
(1)
OLS
(3)
OLS
Individual contribution Individual earning
Initial endowment 0.566*** 0.963***
(0.0348) (0.0270)
Information -1.851*** -3.754***
(0.449) (0.871)
Inequalities in endowments -2.497*** -3.400**
(0.753) (1.425)
Unequal sharing of the pot 1.204** 1.270
(0.508) (0.901)
Previous round unsuccessful 0.249*** 0.423***
(0.0747) (0.144)
Round, learning effect -6.277*** -7.717***
(0.559) (0.668)
Observations 2,250 2,250
R-squared 0.523 0.473
• Information has a negative and significant effect on the
individual contribution as well as on the earning
• Endowment heterogeneity in the game design has a significant
negative influence on the individual earning and contribution.
• Proportional distribution of the common fund has a
significant and positive effect on the contributions.

17. REGRESSION ANALYSIS
Individual variables - Results
Equal
Endow
ment
VARIABLES
(1)
OLS
(3)
OLS
Individual contribution Individual earning
Main income from agriculture 2.364** -2.223**
(0.955) (0.895)
Main income from aquaculture 2.753*** -1.500*
(0.917) (0.846)
Sex, men -0.516 0.244
(0.988) (0.750)
Religion, Muslim 3.768*** -1.711**
(0.898) (0.833)
Age 0.0539* 0.0312
(0.0321) (0.0336)
Education level 0.319*** -0.0843
(0.101) (0.0812)
WMCA, WMO member 0.683 -1.541**
(0.678) (0.662)
Contribution in maintenance fund -0.497 -1.400
(0.881) (0.976)
Land size -0.00208** 0.00162
(0.000942) (0.00131)
Observations 2,250 2,250
R-squared 0.523 0.473
Players are drawing
most of their income
from agriculture or
aquaculture they are
contributing more to
the common fund.
Age as well as the
highest level of
education achieved
determine positively
and significantly the
individual contribution.

18. REGRESSION ANALYSIS
Group variables - Results
Equal
Endow
ment
VARIABLES
(1)
OLS
(3)
OLS
Individual contribution Individual earning
LGED sub-project 2.376*** 2.637***
(0.876) (0.831)
Number of relative in the group -1.073** 0.641
(0.418) (0.475)
Number of close friend in the group -0.312 0.718
(0.405) (0.450)
Same religion within the group 0.767 -0.304
(0.902) (0.841)
Standard deviation of land size 0.00177 0.00189
(0.00141) (0.00132)
Group of men 0.765 1.452*
(0.781) (0.731)
Constant -7.898*** 7.467***
(2.250) (2.264)
Observations 2,250 2,250
R-squared 0.523 0.473
• Group composition in terms
of gender, religion or wealth
doesn’t have any significant
effect on the individual
contribution.
• The more a player is
surrounded by relatives in
his group, the less he
contributes.
• Players from LGED villages are contributing higher amounts in the
common fund than other players whatever are the
individual, group and game characteristics.

19. CONCLUSION
Main results and recommendations
Equal
Endow
ment
1. Principal users and beneficiaries of the infrastructures should
be targeted first for contributing.
2. Homogeneous groups would contribute more and maintain
their infrastructure better.
• But: How to create homogeneous groups in heterogeneous villages?
• Solution: Membership conditions
• Ex: In some WMOs, only landowners can be members.
3. Contributions are higher when there are related benefits.
• But: In reality, benefits are not related to the contributions.
• Solution: Introducing benefits for members, even if not related to water
• Ex: In some WMOs, access to micro-credit for members, fishing rights…
4. Strong institutions support individual contributions for
maintenance.
• Institutions created by the community itself
• Involvement at the early stage of the project, create an ownership, a
willingness (and ability) to cooperate in the future.

20. Thank you
Your questions, comments and suggestions
are welcome!