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Abstract
Private land-use decisions are critical for a broad spectrum of environmental and social
outcomes, ranging from water quality and climate change to rural income distribution. I use a
large dataset of the land-use decisions of New Zealand landowners to estimate a cross-sectional
multinomial logit model of land use. In this model, the optimal land-use choice depends on
geophysical attributes of the land, the cost of access to markets, and on land tenure (Māori
freehold title versus general freehold title). I employ the estimated relationship in a
counterfactual scenario to assess the overall impact of Māori tenure on the willingness of
landowners to supply land for the four most important rural uses in the country: dairying; sheep
or beef farming; plantation forestry; and an economically unproductive use, scrub. This allows
me to conjecture about the environmental implications of New Zealand’s land-tenure system.