Abstract
This research examines perceptions of ecosystem services (ES) and social well-being in the Wuyishan National Park, China. This study analyses the importance of and linkages between them based on the impact of new designation of protected areas on this social-ecological system. Realisation of rural well-being is critical to park-people relations in populated protected areas, and effective resolution is needed to achieve positive conservation outcomes. We conducted 372 structured interviews with community members with different livelihood strategies. Key findings from the research include: (1) the importance of provisioning (e.g., tea, rice, timber) and cultural ES (e.g., local culture, eco-tourism) is related to both current livelihood necessity and future development pursuit. (2) The perceived material well-being is higher than spiritual well-being, and high social well-being is closely related to high-income groups and those that think highly of cultural services, i.e., those engaged in non-agricultural activities (e.g., tourism) and tea cultivation. (3) Cultural values are better preserved in tea and rice cultivation and tourism, but in general, they are not incorporated to improve social well-being. The results suggest that Protected area (PA) management of local communities must seek cultural valorisation for differentiated livelihood strategies for rural people’s sustainable livelihood and stability of the social-ecological system.
Highlights
Ensuring the well-being of rural people in and around protected areas (PAs) is an important prerequisite for local community support to Protected area (PA) management and participation in the sustainable use of natural resources and biodiversity conservation [1]
PAs have vastly different perceptions regarding the provision of ecosystem services (ES) and well-being
In this typical social-ecological system, ecosystems provide a variety of ecosystem services for rural people for a very long time to form different livelihood strategies
Summary
Ensuring the well-being of rural people in and around protected areas (PAs) is an important prerequisite for local community support to PA management and participation in the sustainable use of natural resources and biodiversity conservation [1]. Protected areas, conservation set-asides can involve the loss of access to natural resources, conflict over their preservation and utilisation, and unequal impacts to different resource users [2,3,4,5,6]. In this context, the well-being of the local rural people is becoming a critical facet for conservation practitioners and managers to understand with a social-ecological systems perspective when designing or evaluating impacts of conservation interventions [7,8,9,10]. In the global conservation context, assessing human perceptions of natural capital, ecosystem services, or nature-generated benefits, have proven instrumental for designing and adapting conservation strategies for PAs, in that local communities’
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