Payments For Ecosystem Services Research Articles

Relationship between Payment for Ecosystem Services Programs and Disasters in Southeast Atlantic Forest region, Brazil

Ecosystem services significantly contribute to ecosystems resilience and stability. In this sense, payment for ecosystem services can be designed and applied to prevent or decrease environmental disaster risks. This study aimed at verifying whether municipalities taking part in PES programs present higher number of natural disasters (flood, drought, landslide and fire) between 2009 and 2020 in the Paraíba do Sul river basin. We expected that municipalities having more disaster events would take part in more projects, which we found. Programs can be implemented in response to the increase in natural disasters. We also expected PES calls to explicitly target natural disaster prevention measures and actions, which we did not observe. We found actions related to soil conservation and vegetation cover that might prevent risks, but there were no mentions of disasters. It is concerning that PES in Vale do Paraíba Paulista programs have not been addressing natural disaster risk reduction in a landscape, where floods, droughts, anthropogenic fires and erosion problems associated with hilly reliefs have been increasing in the last years.

The Enduring Effects of China's Payments for Ecosystem Services: Short- and Long-Term Industrial Transformations

The Enduring Effects of China's Payments for Ecosystem Services: Short- and Long-Term Industrial Transformations

Conservation payments and perceptions of equity: Experimental evidence from Indonesia, Peru, and Tanzania

While monetary incentives may be a promising tool for encouraging tropical forest conservation in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the equity implications of such incentives are drawing scrutiny. Furthermore, little is known about how program design shapes perceptions of fairness and equity among program participants, and it remains unclear whether devolving the decision power over the distribution of payments to local leaders helps or harms local perceptions of equity. We implemented a ‘lab-in-the-field’ experiment with 448 participants in rural villages in Indonesia, Peru, and Tanzania, framed around two versions of a collective payments for ecosystem services (PES) program. Participants perceived the program as less equitable when the collective payment was distributed according to the discretion of a locally chosen leader, compared to when the payment was distributed perfectly equally by design. The negative effect is only seen among participants who were given a low share of the payment, which suggests that it is not the involvement of a leader per se that leads to lower perceptions of equity, but the inegalitarian distribution of the payment that sometimes occurs when a leader has the discretion to choose how the payment is distributed. The results highlight the importance of designing conservation incentive programs that give opportunities for local involvement while still encouraging equitable local decisions.

USING PLANETSCOPE DATA TO ESTIMATE CARBON SEQUESTRATION OF MANGROVE FORESTS: A CASE STUDY IN TIEN YEN DISTRICT, QUANG NINH PROVINCE

Mangrove forests, typically found along tropical and subtropical coastlines, have a crucial role in preventing coastal erosion, mitigating the effects of wave actions, and safeguarding coastal habitats. This study utilized PlanetScope mangrove forests and a Combined Mangrove Recognition Index (CMRI), which was suitable for detecting mangrove cover along the coast of Tien Yen district with an overall accuracy of over 93.0% and a Kappa coefficient greater than 0.90 for the selected years. The total area of coastal mangrove forests along the coast of Tien Yen, Quang Ninh province has increased by 137.7 ha in 2023 compared to 2020. The total AGB and AGC of mangrove forests were estimated at 241,730,970 tons and 114,822,211 tons in 2023, respectively. The total CO2 sequestration was estimated at 421,397,514 tons in 2023, which represents a decrease of 17,813,872.1 tons compared to 2020. The study highly suggests the adoption of blue carbon approach for sustainable mangrove management in Tien Yen district, including Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES) schemes. However, certain key factors, such as increasing awareness of the value of the mangrove ecosystem, promoting the involvement of local communities, and revising policy issues related to PES, need to be addressed to ensure the success of the mangrove blue carbon option in Tien Yen district.

Payment for Water-Related Ecosystem Services as a Strategic Watershed Management Approach

Payment for Water-Related Ecosystem Services as a Strategic Watershed Management Approach

A comprehensive strategy for modeling watershed restoration priority areas under epistemic uncertainty: A case study in the Atlantic Forest, Brazil

Hydrological models are useful to support ecosystem services restoration. However, when planning the expansion of Nature-based Solutions and Payments for Ecosystem Services, there are requirements including the principle of additionality, representation of multiple runoff mechanisms and calculation of farm-scale spatial outputs and epistemic uncertainty. While addressing these aspects is important to make future planning more effective (investment costs and water benefits) it is also challenging. This paper integrates, in a single modeling framework, the main requirements highlighted. This allows an improved selection of top priority areas with farm-scale spatial resolution and a deeper understanding of how epistemic modeling uncertainty affects the results, which is relevant to evaluate the risks of overestimating ecosystem services benefits. The modeling approach is demonstrated in a case study watershed in the Atlantic Forest biome (Brazil). The PLANS model is introduced, which uses the design of TOPMODEL to simulate both simulates both saturation-excess and infiltration-excess runoff at the farm-scale resolution. Also, it uses a novel saturation index based in a composition of Height Above the Nearest Drainage and Topographical Wetness Index terrain descriptors. We applied the Generalized Likelihood Uncertainty Estimation method, aided by an evolutionary algorithm, to estimate output epistemic uncertainty. Results show that uncertainty substantially affects priority definition (97% ranking change), and that simulated topographic effects can overcome local effects of land cover and soil type. With better data, uncertainty evaluation indicates that the restoration program in the study case could have the cost of its allocation policy reduced by up to 27%, showing that it can be made more cost- effective with the methods proposed.

How payments for ecosystem services can undermine Indigenous institutions: The case of Peru's Ampiyacu-Apayacu watershed

Payments for ecosystem services have come to dominate international policies for addressing tropical deforestation. Political ecologists, degrowth scholars, and Indigenous activists have critiqued these approaches on the grounds that by centering economic growth, they can disrupt local conservation systems and compromise forest-dwelling communities' ability to protect forests and live well. Meanwhile, Indigenous groups have developed positive alternatives to ‘green growth’ strategies, including buen vivir (good living) in Latin America. In Peru, the National Forest Conservation Program (NFCP) serves as the state's flagship initiative to address tropical deforestation in Indigenous communities by paying communities for demonstrated reductions in deforestation, so long as they invest those funds according to an agreed up on management plan. We analyzed how the NFCP has interacted with quality-of-life plans, Indigenous planning tools rooted in buen vivir. Our findings suggest that the NFCP has eroded local systems for conservation, including the minga, an Amazonian tradition of mutual aid and shared labor for subsistence livelihoods, pushing communities to replace these systems with commodity production and employer-employee relationships. We argue that instead of imposing onerous conditions and steering communities towards evermore commodity production, conservation initiatives should support the implementation of quality-of-life plans. We suggest that climate justice organizers, political ecologists, and degrowth scholars explore and advocate for such initiatives.

Exploring the policy and institutional context of a Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES) scheme for mangroves in southwestern Madagascar

Although Payments for Ecosystem Services schemes emerged since the 1980′s to manage forest ecosystems, their application to mangrove forests is still recent, and evidence of their effectiveness is still questioned towards the complex legal status of mangroves. This study explored the context of policy and institution regarding the Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES) implemented in the mangroves of the Southwestern Madagascar. We used Policy content analysis to examine the interactions between the Madagascar sectoral policies and the PES design frameworks developed under the Reduction of Emission from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD+) mechanism of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. In addition, semi-structured interviews with national and local stakeholders were conducted to identify i) institutional interplay between PES and mangroves and ii) challenges faced with the implementation of PES in the mangroves. We found that environmental, fisheries and land use planning policies that concern mangrove management are coherent with the frameworks and supportive of PES implementation. Lack of clear legal frameworks and coordination between the sectoral ministries, weakness of government organisations due to political instability, and limited local governance capacity are the major challenges for the implementation of PES schemes in mangroves. These led to lower motivation to collaborate in mangrove conservation efforts among the members of local communities. We emphasized that the existence of the mangrove PES initiative like in the Baie des Assassins could be a catalyst for Madagascar to develop clear policy, legislation, and institutions to support effective implementation of the PES schemes in mangroves.

Assessment of the feasibility of applying payment for forest ecosystem services in Vietnamese mangrove forests

Mangroves can play a major role in efforts to mitigate climate change through two pathways. These are (1) carbon sequestration following reforestation of areas where mangroves previously existed, and (2) protection of existing carbon stores in intact mangrove forests. There is considerable international interest in carbon mitigation by governments and businesses as a way of meeting emissions reduction targets, and this could result in significant investment in mangrove restoration and protection. This is likely to have positive benefits in terms of coastal protection, biodiversity protection and new economic activity. This project examined three aspects of mangroves related to the emerging carbon economy. There has been considerable (0.2 million hectares) mangrove restoration in Vietnam and this activity provides insights into the causes of project success or failure. A review of this restoration concluded that the failure of several past restoration projects in Vietnam could be attributed to poor species and site selection and lack of incentives to engage residents in long-term management. The economic, environmental and social aspects of mangrove-shrimp farming or aquaculture (MAS) systems in Ca Mau Province, Vietnam, were examined, and it was concluded that this approach allows the achievement of these multiple objectives. Whereas, most of the discussion around mangroves and their role in carbon management is at the international and national levels, implementation occurs at the local level. It was found that whereas local stakeholders had a reasonable understanding of climate change, they were less clear about carbon markets and the role that mangroves can play. This points to the need for new educational programmes. The study concluded that monitoring and verification systems for both carbon and biodiversity are essential to allow the resultant multiple benefits of carbon mitigation projects to be realised.

Carbon Taxation as An Instrument to Promote Wildfire Prevention and Avoid Biodiversity Loss in Portugal: An Order of Magnitude Analysis

Climate change is one of the main challenges of the current century. Emissions taxes are one of the proposed ways to help in addressing this issue. In this sense, Portugal has introduced an Addition Tax on Carbon Emissions through Law N. 82-D/2014. One of the most notorious impacts of climate change in the country is the wildfires increasing in frequency and intensity. Forests provide various ecosystem services not valued by traditional markets, such as carbon sequestration. Recently, Portugal has created new environmental policies that deal with fire prevention and biodiversity conservation through payment for ecosystem services schemes. In this context, the objective of this work was to perform an order of magnitude analysis of the revenue from the Addition Tax on Carbon Emissions (Law N. 82-D/2014) and contrast it with the investment costs of RCM N. 121/2019 (Payment for Ecosystem Services) and of RCM N. 59/2017 (Prescribed Burning Program). The results indicated that the Addition Tax revenue was much greater than the costs of the other two policies combined, even if expanding the use of prescribed burning in the country. This suggested that these policies can work synergistically, as development agendas recommend, such as the Sustainable Development Goals. This analysis framework might be helpful for other countries, especially in the Mediterranean Basin.

Estimate the Economic Value of the Ecosystem Services: The Case of Forest Landscape Conservation in Malaysia

This study aimed to estimate the economic value of environmental services and to establish the Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES) scheme for the local communities in Janda Baik as financial incentives to be involved in environmental conservation. The contingent evaluation method (CVM) that involved double-bounded dichotomous choice was used in this study

Herder households' livelihood strategies as a response to payments for grassland ecosystem services in China

AbstractHerder households' response is critical in determining the effectiveness of payments for grassland ecosystem services (PGES). This study aimed to comprehensively analyze the influencing factors and processes of herder households' response to PGES using the sustainable livelihood approach. Here, we were the first to classify the ways herder households respond to PGES from the perspective of livelihood strategies, and proposed a sustainable livelihood indicator framework applicable to herder household research. According to the framework, we combined path analysis and statistical analysis to carry out empirical analysis in a typical area. The results show that the response strategies could be divided into three types, which rated by popularity from low to high, were reduction in herd counts (19.1%), livelihood diversification (27.7%) and industrial upgrading (53.1% max). Their formation was influenced by various factors, such as the PGES, vulnerability context, livelihood assets, and livelihood outcomes. In general, strict supervision (influence coefficient 0.46) helped reduce livestock headcounts, especially in small and medium households, which used to be the main bodies of overloading. Households with rising living standards tended to explore off‐farm livelihoods, but there were also some households that did so because of disagreement with PGES. Households with higher vulnerability and higher livelihood assets tended to cope with the shortage of grassland through industrial upgrading, thereby achieving a balanced utilization of grassland resources. This study not only makes an important supplement to PGES and sustainable livelihood theory but also provides an important reference for grassland ecological protection practices around the world.

Assessing the incentives and financial compensation of agroforestry considering the uncertainty of price and yield

Factors such as invasive species, agricultural expansion, and climate change have resulted in global biodiversity loss. When engaging in agricultural expansion, private landowners often choose to plant crops with higher returns than forests provide. However, planting crops leads to the land with low plant coverage, negatively affecting the ecology and reduce biodiversity. Therefore, agroforestry has been one of the recent agricultural policy measures to induce the ecological benefits of farmlands. This study aims to access the payments for ecosystem services (PESs) and economic compensation for agroforestry considering three land use options (i.e., planting rice, corn, and the Taiwan Acacia) under the uncertainty of price and yield with and without support policies. Firstly, the estimated frequency distribution was generated by using the Monte Carlo simulation; then annual income, net present value, annuity, and the PESs at various levels of risk aversion (i.e., strong, moderate, and none) were calculated; and finally, the amounts of economic compensation were assessed. On the basis of Harry Markowitz’s modern portfolio theory, this study evaluated the economic compensation for converting planting a single-type crop to a portfolio of rice, corn, and the Taiwan Acacia; and determined their optimal weights with the minimal risk. The results showed that for farmers with different risk aversion levels, the minimum willingness to accept for economic compensation is approximately $ 657–2,134 ha/yr for rice and $ 667–2,955 ha/yr for corn. The farmers with higher risk aversion are willing to accept lower economic compensation. Regarding the portfolio, farmers with strong risk aversion had incentives to plant trees on less than 15 % of their land, and could receive up to $1,641 as the percentage increased; and farmers with a lower initial investment in the land had more incentives to plant trees.

Modelling crop production, river low flow, and sediment load trade-offs under agroforestry land-use scenarios in Nyangores catchment, Kenya

The largest impact of land-use change on catchment hydrology can be linked to deforestation. This change, driven by exponential population growth, intensified food and industrial production, has resulted in alterations in river flow regimes such as high peaks, reduced base flows, and silt deposition. To reverse this trend more extensive management practices are becoming increasingly important, but can also lead to severe losses in agricultural production. Land-use optimization tools can help catchment managers to explore numerous land-use configurations for the evaluation of trade-offs amongst various uses. In this study, the Soil and water assessment tool (SWAT) model was coupled with a genetic algorithm to identify land-use/management configurations with minimal trade-offs between environmental objectives (reduced sediment load, increased stream low flow) and the crop yields of maize and soybean in Nyangores catchment (Kenya). During the land-use optimization, areas under conventional agriculture could either remain as they are or change to agroforestry or conservation agriculture (CA), where the latter was represented by introducing contour farming and vegetative filter strips. From the sets of the resulting Pareto-optimal solutions we selected mid-range solutions, representing a fair compromise among all objectives, for further analysis. We found that a combined measure implementation strategy (agroforestry on certain sites and conservation agriculture on other sites within the catchment) proved to be superior over single measure implementation strategies. On the catchment scale, a 3.6% change to forests combined with a 35% change to CA resulted in highly reduced sediment loads (−78%), increased low flow (+14%) and only slightly decreased crop yields (<4%). There was a tendency of the genetic algorithm to implement more extensive management practices in the upper part of the catchment while leaving conventional agriculture in the lower part. Our study shows that a spatially targeted implementation strategy for different conservation management practices can remarkably improve environmental sustainability with only marginal trade-offs in crop production at the catchment-level. Incentive policies such as payments for ecosystem services (PES), considering upstream and downstream stakeholders, could offer a practical way to effect these changes.

Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services of Bamboo Carbon Stocks Regulation in the Western Highlands of Cameroon

ABSTRACT In the Western Highlands of Cameroon, natural ecosystems have been significantly degraded, fostering other land-use types like bamboo stands. However, knowledge of the potential contribution of bamboo to climate change mitigation within the framework of payment for ecosystem services remains limited. This study sought to identify bamboo richness and estimate carbon stocks of dominant bamboo species in the context of payment for ecosystem services. Data collection combined information from local informants and biomass data of the main bamboo species. Bamboo biomass was collected by destructive method. The results obtained allow the identification of nine bamboo taxa in the Western Highlands of Cameroon. We found for Bambusa vulgaris and Phyllostachys aurea 13,330 ± 7718 and 38,010 ± 3361 culm ha−1, respectively. Total carbon stocks of bamboo estimated at 122.71 tC ha−1 for B. vulgaris and 125.41 tC ha−1 for P. aurea were not significantly different between bamboo species (Kruskal–Wallis test, p = .908). For bamboo areas in the Western Highlands, the monetary value of ecosystem services linked to bamboo carbon stocks is 1503 ± 624 USD ha−1 ranging from 1486 to 1519 USD ha−1 depending on the bamboo species. The monetary value of bamboo carbon stocks potential should help decision makers to consider adopting bamboo species as one of the sustainable strategies to restore degraded ecosystems.

Designing locally-appropriate conservation incentives for small-scale fishers

Large, long-lived marine animals (‘marine megafauna’) are amongst the world's most threatened taxa, primarily due to overfishing. Reducing fisheries' impacts on marine megafauna is particularly challenging in small-scale fisheries (SSFs), where endangered species can have important consumptive use values. Payments for ecosystem services (PES) have been proposed as a potential solution, but there is a lack of empirical data on if and how they might work in this context. We present a novel combination of methods – scenario interviews with contingent valuation (CV) – for exploring and designing locally-appropriate PES schemes; and apply these methods to investigate how different types of incentives might influence fisher behaviour and mortality of Critically Endangered taxa in two case study SSFs in Indonesia. Fishers almost unanimously supported positive conditional incentives: 98 % and 96 % of fishers would stop landing hammerhead sharks (Sphyrna spp.) and wedgefish (Rhynchobatus spp.), respectively, in contrast to 1 % and 6 % under a business-as-usual scenario, and 52 % and 46 % in response to a negative incentive (fine). CV results showed that an incentive-based scheme for catch mitigation of all hammerheads and wedgefish across both sites could cost US$71,408–235,927 annually, and save up to 18,500 and 2140 individuals, respectively. This study provides empirical evidence that PES could offer a cost-effective and socially-just approach for marine conservation in SSFs; and offers a scalable method for designing locally-appropriate investment-ready schemes, which could support the delivery of societal goals such as net positive outcomes for marine biodiversity and a sustainable and equitable blue economy.

PRESENT STATUS, PROSPECTS AND CONSERVATION OF HILSA, Tenualosa ilisha (CLUPEIFORMES: CLUPEIDAE) FISHERY IN BANGLADESH

Belonging to the family Clupeidae, hilsa shad Tenualosa ilisha (Hamilton, 1822) is an important fish species in the South and Southeast Asia, especially in Bangladesh. Due to its unique nature, the fish has gained national and international demands for its nutritional values, taste qualities, special aroma and high delicacy, and provides livelihoods to the millions of fishers directly or indirectly along the coastal and riverine stretches in its range of natural distribution. It is considered as the national and most important commercial fish species of Bangladesh and contributes significantly to the national economy. In this study, an attempt is made in evaluating the data currently available on hilsa to determine the impact of the current management approaches and improvement strategies of this important fishery. Hilsa is found primarily in marine and estuarine environments, but it has been declining gradually over the last 30 years, reaching a low point in 1991-1992 and continuing until 2002-2003. Recognizing the declining trend of hilsa, the government took action to increase production by implementing regulations on jatka (juvenile) catch and restrictions on brood hilsa catch during the breeding season. As a result, total hilsa catch increased from 2.55 million MT (metric ton) in 2003-04 to 3.94 million MT in 2015-2016. Under the Protection and Conservation of Fish Act of 1950, Hilsa production peaked in 2016-2017, with a total of 4.96 lakh metric tons. Hilsa management techniques contribute 12.9% of all fish produced, while in Bangladesh, the rate of increase in hilsa production is 25.69%. The annual increase of total hilsa production climbed from 3.5% to 9.0% after 2015 as a result of the government's general management activities, payments for ecosystem service (PES) and the environmental management strategies, resulting in annual total hilsa production of 5.50 lakh MT in 2019–2020. A number of recommendations for effective management of the hilsa fisheries that might be implemented into the national policy are elicited in order to improve the situation because the current hilsa management plan has an impact on the conservation of this important fishery to a greater extent in commensurate with its national and international demands.

Heterogeneity Impacts of Farmers’ Participation in Payment for Ecosystem Services Based on the Collective Action Framework

Payments for ecosystem services (PES) are designed to reduce the impact of human activities on eco-sensitive areas. PES programs often adopt economic-incentive and command-control strategies. Increasing the enthusiasm of farmers’ participation is crucial for the sustainability of PES programs and ecosystem restoration. The watershed ecological compensation in Xin’an River Basin is the first horizontal ecological compensation pilot in China. In this study, economic-incentive strategy and command-control strategies in living and farming are implemented simultaneously to improve water quality. Under the collective action framework, we analyze the drivers of farmers’ participation in three concurrent strategies using hierarchical linear models (HLM). The results show: (1) Overall, 81.79%, 76.26%, and 79.11% of farmers are willing to participate in economic-incentive strategy, command-control strategy in living, and command-control strategy in farming, respectively, while 18.21%, 23.74%, and 20.89% are from the village level. (2) Among statistically significant (p < 0.01) factors at the farmer level, social trust (β = 0.305), and social participation (β = 0.134) have positive effects on the economic-incentive strategy; the number of communication and entertainment equipment has a positive effect on the willingness to participate in command-control strategy in living (β = 0.287) and command-control strategy in farming (β = 0.336). (3) At the village level, village characteristics have a direct impact on the farmers’ willingness to participate in strategies. Village woodland area is positively correlated with strategies participation. In addition, village characteristics play a moderating role by influencing farmers’ sustainable livelihood capital. We conclude that different concurrent strategies and collective actions need to be considered in the design of PES programs, particularly in ecologically sensitive areas, which can enrich the theory of collective action and the connotation of PES.

Predicting payment for ecosystem services regarding land use: A simulation study in China

Payment for ecosystem services (PES) is an important policy aiming to promote environmental protection. However, existing studies only focus on the historical PES and ignore their predictions, which leads to the mismatch and inefficient use in funds for supporting PES (PES funds). This paper takes the regions of Zhejiang-Jiangsu-Shanghai in China as the study area, and develops a systematic method integrating land-use change, CA-Markov model and ecosystem service value (ESV) model to predict the PES standards and optimizes PES funds allocation from 2025 to 2040. The results show that farmland and forest will be largely transformed into construction land. ESV will increase and its distribution will involve significant spatial differences caused by the increase in wetland, water, and forest, and the equivalent factor. The PES funds obtained by this region are obviously underestimated; Taking ecological gain as the basis for optimizing PES fund allocation, Zhejiang, Jiangsu and Shanghai obtained 274 million USD, 168 million USD and 150 million USD from 2025 to 2040, respectively. This study can provide a reference for governments of developing countries to manage these funds, improve their use efficiency and alleviate regional contradictions.

Grasp the prior ecosystem services in multi-objective ecological restoration

Multi-objective ecological restoration has the potential ability to provide social-ecological benefits according to different demands, contributing to sustainable development. However, the current multi-objective ecological restoration strategies are mostly dependent on supply-based benefits assessment for ecosystem services enhancement and tend to ignore the priority in different social-ecological systems. We discuss three questions, including why it is important to distinguish primary and secondary weights of ecological restoration objectives; what relationships exist between ecological restoration objectives and ecosystem services across scales; and what the future influences of regional development are on the social-ecological benefits after ecological restoration. Under the four perspectives of supply–demand matching, cost–benefit matching, global–local matching, and present–future matching, we emphasize the need for new approaches in the enhancement of prior ecosystem services to meet global and local demands of current and future social-ecological benefits in ecological restoration. Multi-objective ecological restoration should further emphasize quantifying the dynamics of ecosystem services supply and demand under different ecological restoration objectives, and prioritize the temporal characteristics of the trade-off between multiple benefits of ecological restoration to evaluate long-term benefits with upfront economic costs. Moreover, it is necessary to explore how to establish a regional or global unified market depended on the payments for ecosystem services in ecological restoration.