Organisation des Nations Unies pour l’alimentation et l’agriculture- FAO
Paiements des services environnementaux (PSE) dans les paysages agricoles
Acheteurs de services environnementaux
Environmental services are not easily traded as in many cases they take the form of public goods with the problem of "free riding" (free riders are those who benefit from the service without paying for it). Also, the actual purchaser of an environmental service is often not the same as the beneficiary. Clients of landscape aesthetics of ecosystem services could be anyone interested in the preservation of a given ecosystem or whose well being depends on the services it provides. Depending on the service, there is a wide range of Clients of landscape aesthetics. Table 3.2 presents a list of potential beneficaries and buyers of environmental services.
Table 3.2: Some examples of Buyers of Environmental Services(3)Service |
Beneficiaries |
Buyers |
Carbon Sequestration |
Global community
|
Local, regional, and national governments |
Biodiversity |
Global community |
International and national NGOs |
Water Quality |
Municipalities |
|
Erosion Control |
Hydroelectric providers |
The public sector is a major purchaser of environmental services. When services are public goods or there are diffuse beneficiaries - as it is often the case - PES implementation will be more effective if government agencies act on behalf of those benefiting from the services. By definition, public sector programmes do not have a direct link between buyers and sellers and governments use general tax revenues or external funds. In a few cases revenues are generated through taxes or fees charged directly beneficiaries of the service (e.g. a fuel tax in Costa Rica and water user fees in South Africa ).
Most PES schemes so far are led by the public sector. Such funding for agriculture is the most frequent source of funds for PES programmes. For example, this is the case of the Sloping Lands Program in China , the Conservation Reserve Program in the U.S. , Costa Rica 's Payments for Environmental Services programme and Brazil's Programme of Socio-environmental Development of the Rural Family Production (Proambiente) .
International public sector funding is also very important for PES programme funding. The Swiss and German cooperation agencies are very active in supporting sustainable rural development, though PES in Latin America . The World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) has been supporting the efforts of a programme for developing mechanisms for rewarding the upland poor in South-East Asia, particularly Indonesia and the Philippines for the environmental services they provide (Rewarding Upland Poor for Environmental Services, RUPES). The World Bank and the Global Environment Facility (GEF) have also been major contributors, mainly to large scale projects in developing countries, often leading to the development of national level PES programmes, as is the case in Mexico .
The Private sector is increasingly involved in paying to promote environmental service provision. Examples include payments for voluntary carbon sequestration and biodiversity conservation, payments through non governmental organizations (NGOs) for the adoption of conservation practices, private purchases of water quality services and involvement in ecolabelling and ecotourism initiatives (4). When the provision of environmental services is visible to specific beneficiaries, private companies have been willing to pay providers to ensure continuous provision and manage risk (e.g. a water company willing to pay upper watershed landowners to preserve water quality by adopting sustainable land management practices).
Often, corporations may be motivated by indirect market concerns, like pressure for greater corporate social responsibility and public relations concerns. Consumer pressure is increasingly influencing the behaviour of large companies forcing them to disclose their environmental and social conduct. For example, pressure from environmentally-conscious consumers may cause a company to source timber that has been certified as harvested in a sustainable way). In this frame, through eco-labels and certification programmes for sustainable production, consumers may direct their purchases towards companies and products that act in what they view as an environmentally responsible manner.
Regulatory requirements may lead a company to search for mitigation projects. This is happening widely in terms of carbon offsets, but it is also common in the biodiversity market, in countries like the U.S. , where a company may be required to offset its harm to local biodiversity by voluntarily restoring and enhancing habitat elsewhere.
Agricultural producers themselves rely upon fertile soil, adequate water, pollinating insects, crop genetic diversity and other biodiversity, and protection against biological pests. Thus, individual farmers and farmer organizations are also buyers of ecosystem services. Several schemes are already ongoing, particularly in South America , where farmers downstream have agreed to pay for upstream water flow management so that the amount of water reaching them downstream does not harm their productive capacity.
Not all buyers of services are motivated by profit: environmental groups and philanthropists may fund service providers in order to ensure continued provision of a public good, even for pure existence or bequest value. This happens mainly in the case of biodiversity conservation or landscape aesthetics schemes, associated to protected areas, buffer zones and biological corridors, whose protection and sustainable management are largely financed by donations from international users and philanthropists. Table 3.3 summarizes the types of buyers participating in PES programmes.
Table 3.3 - Types of buyers participating in PES markets and programmes(5)Public sector agencies at different geographical scales who seek to secure 'public goods' on behalf of their constituencies |
e.g. public watershed payments in the U.S. , Mexico , China , South Africa and Brazil , the latter including a River Basin Committee in San Paulo that decided to pay farmers who adopt land use changes that restore the riparian zones and provide watershed services to downstream users |
Private sector companies who are under regulatory obligation to offset environmental impacts and may do so by purchasing ecosystem service credits |
e.g. carbon-emitting companies regulated under the Kyoto Protocol of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) or under biodiversity offset obligations, such as in the U.S. |
Private businesses or organizations who seek to secure ecosystem services for their use values or for other business benefits |
e.g. water bottling companies who pay land users to maintain water quality
|
Consumers of eco-certified products who seek to purchase goods produced in ways consistent with their environmental values. |
e.g. buyers of "rainforest-friendly" coffee or forest products certified to be grown from sustainable sources |
Philanthropic buyers, such as conservation organizations and charitable individuals, who are motivated by non-use values of ecosystem services |
e.g. companies and citizens who offset their carbon emissions without any regulatory requirement to do so, or contributors to NGOs that purchase conservation concessions |
(3) FAO. 2007. The State of Food and Agriculture 2007. Part I: Paying farmers for environmental services. Rome .
(4) ibid.
(5) ibid, adapted.
