Ecosystem Public Services incentive schemes for Agricultural and Forestry Private Management in Developing Countries: A Review.

Cynthia  Carolina Zurita Veliz. 2020. Ecosystem Public Services incentive schemes for Agricultural and Forestry Private Management in Developing Countries: A Review. Master Thesis. The University of Lleida - School of Agrifood, Forestry Science and Engineering

Supervisors
Dr. José-Antonio Bonet (Universitat de Lleida)
Dr. Miguel Sottomayor (Universidade Católica Portuguesa)

Abstract
Recent awareness regarding the importance of Ecosystem Services has given attention to the challenge of designing feasible, long-lasting Payment for Ecosystem Services schemes: this becomes particularly complex in developing countries, where economics resources are often scarce for the most basic and urgent need, therefore governments´ efforts towards PES remain on weekly-enforced policies that appeal more to the collective consciousness about conservation rather than on real-life conditions for the directly-affected communities.
In this context, some Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES) schemes have been applied in the last decade, as a solution that intends to set feasible long-term systems, depending on the information and context conditions. The traditional concept of PES in these cases is still under debate or in need of adaptation to suit the realistic socioeconomic conditions, as well as the available information. Furthermore, some Economic Valuation Methods schemes have been tested in cases like Indonesia, Ecuador, Bolivia and Peru, as an effort to explore the Suppliers´ preferences.
This document intends to present an updated State of The Art review of the published case studies of Developing Countries where these schemes has been applied for ES of the agricultural sector, and intends to provide an exploratory approach that showcases how the particularities of these countries define the future and the possibilities of having such applications as a sustainable PES scheme.

Keywords:
Ecosystem Services – Public Goods – Auctions – Payments – Agriculture – Conservation - Preferences