Preferences For Ecosystem Services Research Articles

Reshaping preferences over coastal and marine environment. Evaluating temporal effects on preferences raised by information campaigns

The present study attempts to evaluate an allegedly promising instrument of environmental policy: public information campaigns for raising awareness, as reflected by enhanced environmental preferences. We evaluate an intensive campaign addressing plastic pollution in a coastal and marine environment, an issue of high environmental importance which is increasingly attracting public interest. Using stated preference surveys, we evaluate the effects of the campaign on preferences for ecosystem services and environmental goods. Our focus lies in the temporal effects across seasons, inducing different ecosystem services, approximating the effects of information on use and non-use values.Our findings indicate that systematic provision of information can enhance preferences and, although a time-decay effect exists, awareness remains significantly enhanced after the end of the campaign albeit not uniformly across different (use and non-use) values. As the impacts on preferences are subject to variation of seasonal experience with ecosystems - implying variation in the intensity of use – additional to a time-decay effect, it emerges that although information is a necessary instrument of environmental policy, it cannot be a sufficient one. An effective policy, addressing the needs of future generations, also requires instruments that give economic signals (taxes) and constrain preferences (standards) with information provision enhancing their impacts.

Integrating biodiversity and ecosystem services to identify ecological priorities for an ecologically fragile city in China

AbstractA high rate of urbanization comes with high environmental costs, leading to reductions in biodiversity and ecosystem services (BES). How to maximize the efficiency and representation of BES in cities is of utmost urgency. However, in the process of spatial prioritization identification, it remains unclear whether a preference for ecosystem services (ES) promotes or detracts from biodiversity. In this study, a Marxan‐based spatial conservation prioritization framework is provided to achieve a win–win situation for ES provision and biodiversity protection. Using Hohhot city, China as a study case, it sets up different weighting scenarios with species and five ES to determine the optimal protected area network for each possible combination. At the same time, it tests the conservation costs, protected features, and spatial overlap of different scenarios with existing protected areas to quantify their conservation efficiency. We found that (1) closed deciduous broadleaved forests, closed evergreen needle‐leaved forests, and deciduous shrublands could support both high biodiversity and abundant ES at altitudes of 1600–2000 m. (2) Although a positive association is found between ES and biodiversity, there is some spatial variation. The geographical overlap rate with biodiversity prioritization was only 29.72% when only ES were considered. (3) Conservation of ecological hotspots by increasing the weight of ES can reduce conservation expenses by 0.69%–20.32% compared to meeting solely biodiversity targets. Our analyses highlight the need for an appropriate weighting of ES in decisions seeking to identify protected areas. This study provides methodological support for the integration of ES and biodiversity, facilitating more comprehensive conservation planning decisions.

Living environment shaped residents’ willingness to pay for ecosystem services in Yangtze River Middle Reaches Megalopolis, China

Profound understanding on the diversity of local residents’ willingness to pay (WTP) for ecosystem services (ESs) may aid evaluation of policy impacts by uncovering trade-offs and synergies for achieving sustainable environmental resource management. However, the reasons for the spatial preference heterogeneity of WTP are still unclear. In this study, an extensive survey with 4,580 residents in the Yangtze River Middle Reaches Megalopolis (YRMRM), central China, was carried out to investigate the public’s WTP to maintain and improve ESs. We identified key influencing factors and explored how they shaped the preference heterogeneity in WTP by random forest model and surface fitting method. Our results showed that 81.4% of residents reported WTP for ESs greater than zero. Water supply, waste treatment, food supply and raw material supply were the preferred ESs for residents. Living environment factors (i.e., extent of farmland, water and forest near the residence) were found as the key drivers of WTP. Proximity to farmland, water and forests resulted in high WTP values for a series of specific ESs. The reasons for the heterogeneity of WTP are (1) the difference in proximity to farmland, water and forest (i.e., the contributor to ESs), (2) the divergence of local residents’ preferences for ESs. This study disclosed the heterogeneity and causes of public preferences in YRMRM, which could help policy and decision makers to develop eco-compensation initiatives towards conservative and sustainable use of the environmental resources.

The importance of considering human well-being to understand social preferences of ecosystem services

Evaluations about social preferences for ecosystem services do not always include human well-being. Using a case study in South-Central Chile, we showed how the human well-being approach might reveal social preferences on ecosystem services. We used a socio-cultural approach to compare social preferences for provisioning, regulating, and cultural services and the links people establish to human well-being. From an online questionnaire, we collected 214 responses, balanced in gender (49/51 % men/women, respectively), diverse in age (18 to 62 years), but with 68 % under 30 years. Water for human consumption and agriculture, food, and native forest products were the most preferred provisioning services (40, 28, and 21 %, respectively). In contrast, products from tree plantations were considered the lowest ones. Pollution control (40 %) and water provision during summer (18 %) were the preferred regulating services, while biodiversity conservation (25 %) and environmental education (22 %) were primarily selected cultural ones. We found a clear preference pattern for provisioning services but not for regulating and cultural services. Even though people linked multiple ES to human well-being, some links’ patterns mirrored preferences for provisioning services but not for regulating and cultural services. However, although cultural services did not show a clear preference pattern, people perceived their importance by linking them to various benefits. Understanding social preferences of ES based on their links with human well-being helps to address their relevance and potential trade-offs for land planning and management decision-making and convert the ES concept into decision-making instruments.

Land Use Preference for Ecosystem Services and Well-Being in Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh

Researchers increasingly investigate ecosystem services to assess their role in supporting livelihoods, well-being and economic value in order to inform decision-making. Many studies have explored links between ecosystem services and community-based livelihoods, with a very narrow focus on the importance of land use to well-being. We evaluated the value of ecosystem services from various land uses supporting livelihoods and the overall well-being of local communities in the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) of Bangladesh. By applying a participatory habitat valuation approach with the ethnic communities from eight villages, we explored their preferences for, and perceptions of, ecosystem services and their sources in a multi-functional landscape under different land use, i.e., forest, swidden and low-land agriculture, fruit orchard and water bodies, and three land ownership contexts (state, private and mixed ownership on forest lands). Our findings revealed that community land use preference for ecosystem services supports ten different well-being needs. Among others, forests were valued land used for two-thirds of well-being needs, including the provision of shelter, nutrition, primary health care, an adequate supply of potable water, a lower level of ecological stress (i.e., protection from associated landslide soil erosion), cultural and spiritual benefits and livestock foraging. People commonly valued the food, income and nutrition contributions of all land uses. However, different forest and land ownership contexts and rights within the landscape influence people’s preference for ecosystem services from land use in supporting their well-being. People with secure ownership (i.e., private and private-community) showed a broad and positive appreciation for ecosystem services to meet their well-being needs. Our study highlights that local and ethnic people’s land-use preferences and ownership contexts are critical factors in assessing well-being in the context of multifunctional landscapes. We recommend that ecosystem services be considered in future decision-making related to forest and land use to support human well-being.

Assessing local people's perceptions and preference for ecosystem services to support management plan in Omo Biosphere Reserve, Nigeria

Little attention has been given to local people's perception of and preferences for ES, especially in developing countries. Such disregard of local community's priorities for ecosystem services (ES) can lead to non-coherent development plans and minimise community participation in ES-based conservation. Therefore, this study conducted an ES assessment to understand how local people perceive the importance of ES and how they prioritise ES. A questionnaire survey was conducted among 302 residents in 65 enclaves of Omo Biosphere Reserve (OBR), Nigeria. Data analyses including logistic regression analysis and spatial analysis were carried out to explain the residents' responses to survey items. Respondents identified crops, fruits, water, firewood as the preferred ES. The explicit spatial maps showed a high priority for ES around the North-Western, Eastern and Southern region of the Reserve. Gender, age group, education level, income level and household size all played essential roles in the importance of ES. Income and household size were the only sociodemographic factors that influenced the willingness of the local people to conserve ES. This study could help to make an informed decision on the management of the resources and facilitate the provision of ES in the reserve. Thus, this research could contribute to the effective implementation of the Lima Action Plan (LAP) in OBR.

Integrating Land Use, Ecosystem Service, and Human Well-Being: A Systematic Review

Global change, population growth, and urbanization have been exerting a severe influence on the environment, including the social system and ecosystem. To find solutions based on nature, clarifying the complicated mechanisms and feedback among land use/land cover changes, ecosystem services, and human well-being, is increasingly crucial. However, the in-depth linkages among these three elements have not been clearly and systematically illustrated, present research paths have not been summarized well, and the future research trends on this topic have not been reasonably discussed. In this sense, the purpose of this paper is to provide an insight into how land use/land cover changes, ecosystem services, and human well-being are linked, as well as their relationships, interacting ways, applications in solving ecological and socioeconomic problems, and to reveal their future research trends. Here, we use a systematic literature review of the peer-reviewed literature to conclude the state of the art and the progress, emphasize the hotspot, and reveal the future trend of the nexus among the three aspects. Results show that (1) ecosystem services are generally altered by the changes in land use type, spatial pattern, and intensity; (2) the nexus among land use change, ecosystem services, and human well-being is usually used for supporting poverty alleviation, ecosystem health, biodiversity conservation, and sustainable development; (3) future research on land use/land cover changes, ecosystem services, and human well-being should mainly focus on strengthening multiscale correlation, driving force analysis, the correlation among different group characteristics, land use types and ecosystem service preferences, and the impact of climate change on ecosystem services and human well-being. This study provides an enhanced understanding of the nexus among the three aspects and a reference for future studies to mitigate the relevant problems.

Tweeting the Laurentian Great Lakes: A community opinion analysis about Great Lakes areas as assessed through mentions on Twitter

Accounting for community opinions of environmental restoration is critical both for planning and evaluating these initiatives. While considerable research assesses the value of restoration through economic metrics focusing on expenditures or preferences for ecosystem services, these metrics may not adequately account for the sociocultural services that ecosystems provide communities, such as mental and physical health or recreational opportunities. To address this challenge, we explored the use of social media data to assess online discourse communities’ opinions about ecosystem services through a case study of Twitter mentions of sites targeted for restoration through the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI). While there is evidence of the economic and ecological benefits of GLRI, little is known about how these benefits at sites targeted for funding are perceived by the public. From April through October 2019, we collected 40,000 tweets that mentioned an Area of Concern or a Great Lakes National Park that received GLRI funding. We used a mixed-methodological approach combining tweet content and sentiment analysis to determine themes of discussion and characterize online discourse communities’ opinions around these topics. Half of all tweets were about one of three Areas of Concern, and recreation was the most discussed theme with an overall positive sentiment. A metric accounting for the number of tweets and the sentiment of tweets was derived to understand community opinions of restoration at these areas. Our findings demonstrate the potential of social media data mining as a tool for examining online conversations about and engagement with the Great Lakes.

Preferences of vulnerable social groups for ecosystem-based adaptation to flood risk in Central Vietnam

Developing countries are increasingly impacted by floods, especially in Asia. Traditional flood risk management, using structural measures such as levees, can have negative impacts on the livelihoods of social groups that are more vulnerable. Ecosystem-based adaptation (EbA) provides a complementary approach that is potentially more inclusive of groups that are commonly described as more vulnerable, such as the poor and women. However, there is a lack of disaggregated and quantitative information on the potential of EbA to support vulnerable groups of society. This paper provides a quantitative analysis of the differences in vulnerability to flooding as well as preferences for EbA benefits across income groups and gender. We use data collected through a survey of households in urban and rural Central Vietnam which included a discrete choice experiment on preferences for ecosystem services. A total of 1,010 households was surveyed during 2017 through a random sampling approach. Preferences are measured in monetary and non-monetary terms to avoid issues that may arise from financial constraints faced by respondents and especially the more vulnerable groups. Our results reveal that lower income households and women are overall more vulnerable than their counterparts and have stronger preferences for the majority of the EbA benefits, including flood protection, seafood abundance, tourism, and recreation suitability. These findings strongly indicate that EbA is indeed a promising tool to support groups of society that are especially vulnerable to floods. These results provide crucial insights for future implementation of EbA projects and for the integration of EbA with goals targeted at complying with the Sendai Framework and Sustainable Development Goals.

Disentangling ecosystem services preferences and values

Preferences for ecosystem services provide information on what people find important in their human-nature relationships, which can enhance environmental governance. However, preferences are ‘reason-blind’, obscuring the underlying values that shape them. Increasingly, values – concepts or beliefs about desirable end states or behaviours that transcend specific situations and guide behaviour – receive attention in environmental governance, but lack of clarity in values terminology could hamper communication and reduce the ability to successfully align governance. There is a need to disentangle preferences and values to examine whether ecosystem services preferences provide adequate information on people’s values. Seychelles provides an interesting case to study the relationship between policy, preferences, and values, due to recent neoliberal economic restructuring and emergence of the blue economy. We conducted 50 semi-structured interviews with resource users (fishers, tourism operators) and 130 population-wide Portrait Values Questionnaires to explore differences across the population and examine the link between values and preferences. We find a disconnect between ecosystem services preferences and underlying values. Exploring people’s reasons for prioritising ecosystem services can improve understanding of underlying values, contribute to reconciling conflict, and clarify impacts on communities. Newly introduced worldviews and values accompanying the blue economy have the potential to clash with collectivist values found in Seychelles. Potential mismatches need explicit discussion to make decision-making more procedurally complete, but also improve equity and public support.

Social indicators of ecosystem restoration for enhancing human wellbeing

This study implements the ecosystem service framework to link the concepts of farming activity and ecosystem restoration within the circular economy. It proposes a method for identifying social indicators of ecosystem restoration that can be taken into account in the transition towards more circular and sustainable agricultural systems. Using a case study located in semi-arid Mediterranean landscapes, we conducted a social sampling with 350 respondents to explore how an almond tree restoration changes perceptions and preferences for ecosystem services, and how these socio-ecological changes translate into indicators of natural capital and human wellbeing. Results not only indicated that the almond tree restoration induced changes in people´s preferences and perceptions for ecosystem services, such as an increase in ecosystem service diversity (i.e., local identity and erosion control), but they also demonstrated how the social and cultural benefits associated to ecosystem services can be used as indicators of human well-being (i.e., human health and access to goods). We suggest that the inclusion of social indicators of ecosystem restoration must be included in policies and initiatives for a transition to circular economy, and to achieve the challenges of the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration.

Community-Based Importance and Quantification of Ecosystem Services, Disservices, Drivers, and Neotropical Dry Forests in a Rural Colombian Municipality

Few studies analyze people’s preferences for ecosystem services (ES), disservices (ED) and drivers of change in less populated, tropical municipalities. Understanding such preferences and needs by the community and stakeholder groups before actually assessing, modelling, and measuring the supply of ES is key for decision-making and planning in municipalities, as well as for the conservation of nearby neotropical dry forests. We studied these dynamics in a small rural municipality in Colombia with limited data availability using semi-structured interviews and surveys, as well as ES-proxies and geospatial analyses. We then analyzed the supply and importance of two community identified ES and one ED from adjacent neotropical dry forests during 2005–2017. We found that respondents recognized air purification and food production as the most important ES. Increased temperatures and fires were the most important ED, while fires were also identified as an important driver of change. Air purification, via pollutant deposition to forest cover, remained approximately constant (116 ton/year), while food production (49 ton/ha) and fire occurrence, an ED, increased. Findings show how transdisciplinary research and participatory knowledge co-production among local communities, researchers and land management institutions can improve governance, decision making, policy uptake and planning efforts.

Spatial clustering of willingness to pay for ecosystem services

AbstractVariations of willingness to pay (WTP) in geographical space have been characterised by the presence of localised patches of higher and lower values. However, to date, spatial valuation studies have not explored whether the distribution of hot (cold) spots of WTP is particular to each environmental good or if it follows similar patterns to other, comparable, environmental goods. We address this question by contrasting the spatial patterns of hot (cold) clusters of WTP for improvements in several ecosystem services. We geocoded individual‐specific WTP estimates derived from a discrete choice experiment exploring preferences for ecosystem service improvements for three different catchment areas in Scotland comprising urban, agricultural, riverine and estuarine ecosystems. The local Moran's I statistic was used to find statistically significant local clusters and identify hot spots and cold spots. Finally, Multi‐type Ripley's K and L functions were used to contrast the spatial patterns of local clusters of WTP among ecosystem services, and across case studies. Our results show that hotspots of WTP for environmental improvements tend to occur close to each other in space, regardless of the ecosystem service or the area under consideration. Our findings suggest that households sort themselves according to their preferences for estuarine ecosystem services.

The impact of academic information supply and familiarity on preferences for ecosystem services

Preferences elicitation can be a challenging exercise for citizens participating in assessment surveys. It is even more challenging when it comes to complex and unfamiliar ecosystems and the threatened ecosystem services they provide. Making people aware of the characteristics of the ecosystem services being valued is determinant for the assessment process. We investigated the impact of familiarity and academic information supply on people's preferences for twenty selected ecosystem services of French Mediterranean coastal lagoons. The results show that regardless of familiarity and information supply, there is a strong consensus about the highest importance of regulation and maintenance ecosystem services as well as environmental education and research opportunity ecosystem services. By contrast, nine of the cultural ecosystem services, together with two provisioning ecosystem services showed heterogeneous preferences among the different citizen groups. Using a combination of descriptive and inferential statistics these eleven ecosystem services split up into three clusters characterized as (i) contemplative leisure, (ii) heritage, and (iii) consumptive activities. Familiarity and academic information supply had a strong impact on the preferences for these three clusters of ecosystem services.

Heterogeneous preferences of citizens towards agricultural ecosystem services: the demand relevance in a choice experiment

ABSTRACT Agri-environmental policies affect many ecosystem services from agricultural environments. Valuing ecosystem services with choice experiments requires operationalization of these services for the survey and a careful attribute selection process, as the attributes need to be relevant to respondents. In this paper, we expand the concept of demand relevance of attributes to include not only the importance of ecosystem services to the respondent, but also the success in the supply of these services and the need to improve them. We examined this in the context of citizens’ preferences for ecosystem services from agri-environments. The results revealed five citizen groups with differing preferences. Respondents with high demand relevance for ES in the survey were divided into those emphasizing existence values and those emphasizing ES more directly related to the human use of ecosystems. In turn, low demand relevance for the ES was associated with a non-significant cost attribute, preventing the estimation of WTP for these respondents, and led to anomalies in choices. Our findings emphasize the need to take respondents’ heterogeneity with respect to preferences, but also to demand relevance, into account in data analysis and support the inclusion of other factors than the importance of attributes when examining demand relevance.

Environmental attitudes and place identity as determinants of preferences for ecosystem services

Stated preference methods are frequently employed to measure people's willingness to pay (WTP) for ecosystem services. However, these techniques are also criticized for following a simplified approach, which often ignores the role of complex psychological and sociological factors, such as general environmental attitudes and place identity beliefs. By means of a discrete choice experiment exercise, we explored the influence of general environmental attitudes and place identity perceptions on WTP, taking peatland restoration in Scotland as a case study. Our research adds to the existing literature by providing a more nuanced picture of the determinants of WTP and by exploring and mapping the distribution of the estimated welfare measures. Our results, obtained from the estimation of hybrid choice models, show that people with more positive environmental attitudes and greater attachment to peatlands and Scotland tend to display higher WTP for peatland restoration. However, differences exist across respondents, depending on their socio-demographic profile and the geographical area. A better understanding of the heterogeneity of preferences for ecosystem services is helpful to guide more efficient policy design and to inform policy-makers about the distributional impacts of planned policies for equity considerations in project appraisal.

Urbanization alters ecosystem service preferences in a Small Island Developing State

Urbanization entails social, economic and environmental changes that can transform how people relate to nature and disconnect them from it, with consequences for their wellbeing. The impacts of urbanization on human-nature relationships viewed through people’s ecosystem service (ES) preferences are however poorly understood, especially in the rapidly urbanizing Global South. We tested the hypothesis that, although both urban and rural people depend on ES, people in cities would value ES less because they are less directly connected to ecosystems. Using a paired urban–rural study design, we conducted 200 interviews with urban and rural dwellers along the coast of the Solomon Islands, a Small Island Developing State (SIDS), to compare the importance they attributed to different ES and ecosystem disservices (EDS) for wellbeing, as well as their satisfaction with ES. Although urban and rural dwellers reported that ES were very important for their wellbeing, urban dwellers’ ratings were lower, supporting our hypothesis. Urban dwellers were less satisfied than rural dwellers with the benefits that they received from ES and would have preferred to benefit more, showing that they were less connected to nature. Both urban and rural dwellers perceived important negative impacts from EDS. Thus, even a relatively recent urbanization process can alter people’s relationships with nature, reducing significantly the benefits that people derive from ecosystems. Urban planning and environmental management can help reconnect people to nature and create more sustainable cities by addressing people’s needs and preferences towards nature, as revealed through ES and EDS socio-cultural valuation.

Preferences for ecosystem services provided by urban forests in South Korea

The existence of tradeoffs and synergies between ecosystem services emphasize the need to understand the preferences of ecosystem service beneficiaries. In this paper, the preferences of ecosystem services provided by different types of urban forests in South Korea are analyzed to provide insights on the improved distribution and supply of ecosystem services. The Delphi technique was utilized to elicit expert opinions on the categorization of ecosystem services provided by urban forests. A choice experiment on 500 Seoul citizens was then conducted to analyze the preferences for 7 types of ecosystem services – food provision, water flow regulation, noise reduction, microclimate regulation & air quality improvement, moderation & prevention of landslides, biodiversity enhancement, recreation, and health services. An AHP analysis was carried out to investigate experts’ ranking of the relative importance of these ecosystem services. The results showed that except for microclimate regulation & air quality improvement, Seoul citizens’ preferences for different types of urban forests did not differ according to the attribute level of each ecosystem service. There were also no significant differences between the preferences for urban natural parks and urban neighborhood parks, possibly indicating that Seoul citizens perceive them to be similar. Secondly, the results indicate a higher preference for urban forests with certain features, such as a higher proportion of fruit trees and deciduous trees, higher leaf area, denser tree canopy cover, wider distances between trees, and higher levels of species richness. The enhancement of biodiversity was considered the most influential service for Seoul citizens in their choice of urban forests. Seoul citizens were willing to pay 12,176 KRW/year and 21,036 KRW/year to enhance the level of biodiversity from “poor” to “average” and from “average” to “rich,” respectively. Finally, preferences and relative importance for almost all ecosystem services were different for citizens and experts. As it is impossible to maximize the provision of all ecosystem services concurrently, policymakers and urban forest managers need to consider citizens’ preferences and opinions when designing and managing urban forests in order to increase user satisfaction and welfare.

Local Residents' Perceptions for Ecosystem Services: A Case Study of Fenghe River Watershed.

To make environmental management decisions more executive and targeted, it is essential for decision-making to include local residents’ perceptions and preferences for ecosystem services (ES) and biodiversity (BD). This study conducted a questionnaire survey with 386 local residents to explore social perceptions for ES and BD in the Fenghe River watershed. ES contain food from agriculture (AGR), food from livestock (LIV), fresh water (FW), air purification (AP), water purification (WP), water retention (WR), soil retention (SR), aesthetics (AES), recreation (RE), and spirit (SP) in this study. Ranking and Likert scales are combined to identify residents’ preferences for ES and BD. The hypothetical market method is used to identify the willingness to pay for BD and ES. Independent sample T-test, one-way ANOVA, and Spearman correlation are used to analyze preference heterogeneity. The results show that: (1) residents prefer WP, AP, AGR, and FW; (2) 51.3% of respondents are willing to pay a fee for improving ES while 48.7% of respondents are unwilling to pay; (3) residents’ personal and residential factors affect preference heterogeneity. Last, we put forward three management suggestions on controlling environmental pollution, improving residents’ awareness of ES, and establishing a multi-channel fund based on government financial resources for improving ES in the Fenghe River watershed. Integrating stakeholders’ perceptions for ES into decision-making can promote the sustainable development in Fenghe River watershed.

Exploring social preferences for ecosystem services of multifunctional agriculture across policy scenarios

Multifunctional agroecosystems are the result of complex adaptive interactions between humans and nature where trade-offs between food production and other ecosystem services are key. Our objective is to explore the social preferences for ecosystem services, and the associated willingness to pay, in three multifunctional agroecosystem in Europe (Mediterranean, Atlantic, Alpine) under alternative agrienvironmental policy scenarios. We use the same methodology (a choice experiment including equivalent attributes and levels) to rank and estimate the economic value of provisioning, regulating, supporting and cultural ecosystem services. We define the scenarios (current situation, abandonment and enhanced management) in biophysical terms to elucidate changing relations between social perception and level of delivery of ecosystem services. We derive some lessons. i) Value of ES: biodiversity and regulating ecosystem services always produce welfare gains; people, however, perceive trade-offs between delivery of agricultural landscapes and quality food products. Nevertheless, preferences are heterogeneous and vary across regions, scenarios and ES. ii) Policymaking: society’s willingness to pay for the delivery of ecosystem service exceeds largely the current level of public support. Moreover, further abandonment and intensification of agriculture is clearly rejected by the public. iii) Methodological: monetary valuation is context dependent and extrapolation of economic values can be misleading.