Organisation des Nations Unies pour l’alimentation et l’agriculture- FAO
Paiements des services environnementaux (PSE) dans les paysages agricoles
Ciblage des fournisseurs
Targeting the most efficient providers and making sure that the scheme does result in an improvement in the ecosystem service provision remains the greatest challenge.
Type de paiement
Direct payments to land managers can take different forms. Cash is the most common form but in-kind payments are also used.
Some schemes offer tree seedlings when the scheme involves reforestation or agro-forestry, or other materials to replace forgone production such as grain (like in the Chinese national sloping lands conversion programme-SLCP) or conditional investments in activities that can compensate the farmers for restriction of resource use (in Pimampiro, Ecuador, in return for conservation of cloud forest the project in which a PES component is embedded supported the development of orchid nurseries) - see table 4.5 for examples.
Table 4.5. Examples of payment forms in PES programmes (14) |
|
Chinese Sloping Lands Conversion Programme- SLCP |
|
| Priority areas | farmers on erosion-prone sloping land (slope greater than 25 degrees) within the upper watershed of the Yangtze river and in the upper and middle parts of Yellow river |
| Compensation levels | • In cash, regular : 417 Yuan/ha/yr (US$ 50) for farmers in the Yangtze River Basin and 290 Yuan/ha/yr (US$ 36) for those in the Yellow river basin. |
| • In cash, one-off : seed and planting subsidy: one-off 750 yuan/ha ($US 93). | |
| • In kind, regular : grain rations: 300kg/ha/yr (worth US$ 60 ha/yr) to compensate for land set-aside in Yangtze River watershed and 200 kg/ha/yr (worth US$ 40 ha/yr) for those along the Yellow River. | |
| • Both cash and grain payments are awarded for five years for production trees and eight years for protection trees. | |
|
All together, farmers get about 100USD/ha/yr (50 in cash and 50 worth of grain in kind) |
| Costa Rica National PES programme | |
| Priority areas | Priority criteria combine environmental and social indicators. For example, projects must be as many of these criteria as possible: • biological corridors forest areas |
| • strategic areas for the protection of water resources | |
| • in privately owned areas, within the protected areas | |
| • areas where the Social Development Index is under 40% | |
| Compensation levels | • Forest conservation: US$ 64/ha/yr for 5 years |
| • Natural regeneration: US$41/ha/yr for 5 years | |
| • Reforestation: US$ 816 over 10 years (being the first payment of 46% to cover plantation costs) | |
| • Agroforestry: US$ 1.3 per tree | |
| Mexico National PES programme (PSAH) | |
| Priority areas | Private or communal landowners well-preserved forest (with at least 80% forest cover) in: Critical recharge areas for the over-exploited aquifers of the country (according to CNA spell out/footnote classification); OR near streams, in regions with problems of water scarcity, poor water quality and high sediment loads and where hydrological natural disasters are more frequent; OR in areas that supply urban centres of more than 5,000 inhabitants; OR in priority mountain areas (designated by CONAFOR, IF they are also facing water problems). |
| Compensation levels | Forest conservation |
| • primary forest: $300 pesos/ha/yr (about US$27) | |
|
• cloud forest: $400 pesos/ha/yr (about US$36) |
Other more indirect types of payments also exist. For example exemptions from land-based municipal taxes for landowners willing to adopt certain practices or to set aside priority land for conservation, or allowing access to public protected areas to pastoral communities who agree to do it under specific conditions that do not harm the protected ecosystems (or may even have positive effects - pastoralist groups allowed to move into protected areas in certain times of the year).
Because in some contexts, cash payments can be confused with a payment for the land itself (15), in some parts of the world in-kind compensations are more welcome and even more valuable. In an emerging scheme in Indonesia (Sumberjaya, Sumatra, led by RUPES (16)), offering farmers the possibility to legalize their land tenure situation has very valuable multiplier effects: it frees them from fear of eviction and allows them to access government social services, such as health and education.
In- kind payments can also be a more lasting benefit as cash payments are more vulnerable to rapid spending. However cash allows participant recipients greater flexibility in the use of resources, more readily replaces (temporary or permanent) loss income complying with the introduced land use changes and is less prone to being seen as a paternalistic. For more pros and cons, see an example in the table 4.6.
Table 4.6 . Cash vs in-kind payments - Perceptions in a case in Bolivia (17) |
| Beehives preferred |
| • Some recipients reject money |
| • Cash would be spent rapidly and leave no long-term benefits |
| • Receiving cash 'smells' more like giving up future property rights |
| • Honey is a useful subsistence or sellable product |
| • Beekeeping includes an incentive to protect forest as bee habitat |
| • Demonstration effect (to neighbours) of bees and the sweet taste of honey gives |
| • ES programme implementers more goodwill than a corresponding cash transfer |
| Cash preferred |
| • Some recipients little skilled and little interested in beekeeping, thus losing benefits |
| • Beehives are inflexible assets to sell, compared to animals or equipment |
| • Beehives are inflexible assets to subdivide, compared to cash |
| • Beehives represent extra training costs for implementing NGO |
| • Beehives represent extra costs for recipients to benefit - beekeeping demands labour inputs |
(15)See for example Beyond "Markets" Why Terminology Matters by Sven Wunder and Maria Teresa Vargas
(16)RUPES - an ICRAF program for developing mechanisms for rewarding the upland poor in Asia for the environmental services they provide - RUPES
(17) Nina Robertson and Sven Wunder. Fresh tracks in the forest: assessing incipient payments for environmental services initiatives in Bolivia. CIFOR, Bogor, Indonesia
