Benefits of Investing in Ecosystem Restoration

Measures aimed at conservation or restoration of ecosystems are often seen as net‐cost projects by governments and businesses because they are based on incomplete and often faulty cost‐benefit analyses. After screening over 200 studies, we examined the costs (94 studies) and benefits (225 studies) of ecosystem restoration projects that had sufficient reliable data in 9 different biomes ranging from coral reefs to tropical forests. Costs included capital investment and maintenance of the restoration project, and benefits were based on the monetary value of the total bundle of ecosystem services provided by the restored ecosystem. Assuming restoration is always imperfect and benefits attain only 75% of the maximum value of the reference systems over 20 years, we calculated the net present value at the social discount rates of 2% and 8%. We also conducted 2 threshold cum sensitivity analyses. Benefit‐cost ratios ranged from about 0.05:1 (coral reefs and coastal systems, worst‐case scenario) to as much as 35:1 (grasslands, best‐case scenario). Our results provide only partial estimates of benefits at one point in time and reflect the lower limit of the welfare benefits of ecosystem restoration because both scarcity of and demand for ecosystem services is increasing and new benefits of natural ecosystems and biological diversity are being discovered. Nonetheless, when accounting for even the incomplete range of known benefits through the use of static estimates that fail to capture rising values, the majority of the restoration projects we analyzed provided net benefits and should be considered not only as profitable but also as high‐yielding investments. Beneficios de Invertir en la Restauración de Ecosistemas     

Spatial cost–benefit analysis of blue restoration and factors driving net benefits globally

Marine coastal ecosystems, commonly referred to as blue ecosystems, provide valuable services to society but are under increasing threat worldwide due to a variety of drivers, including eutrophication, development, land-use change, land reclamation, and climate change. Ecological restoration is sometimes necessary to facilitate recovery in coastal ecosystems. Blue restoration (i.e., in marine coastal systems) is a developing field, and projects to date have been small scale and expensive, leading to the perception that restoration may not be economically viable. We conducted a global cost–benefit analysis to determine the net benefits of restoring coral reef, mangrove, saltmarsh, and seagrass ecosystems, where the benefit is defined as the monetary value of ecosystem services. We estimated costs from published restoration case studies and used an adjusted-value-transfer method to assign benefit values to these case studies. Benefit values were estimated as the monetary value provided by ecosystem services of the restored habitats. Benefits outweighed costs (i.e., there were positive net benefits) for restoration of all blue ecosystems. Mean benefit:cost ratios for ecosystem restoration were eight to 10 times higher than prior studies of coral reef and seagrass restoration, most likely due to the more recent lower cost estimates we used. Among ecosystems, saltmarsh had the greatest net benefits followed by mangrove; coral reef and seagrass ecosystems had lower net benefits. In general, restoration in nations with middle incomes had higher (eight times higher in coral reefs and 40 times higher in mangroves) net benefits than those with high incomes. Within an ecosystem type, net benefit varied with restoration technique (coral reef and saltmarsh), ecosystem service produced (mangrove and saltmarsh), and project duration (seagrass). These results challenge the perceptions of the low economic viability of blue restoration and should encourage further targeted investment in this field.     

Predicting landscape-scale biodiversity recovery by natural tropical forest regrowth

Natural forest regrowth is a cost-effective, nature-based solution for biodiversity recovery, yet different socioenvironmental factors can lead to variable outcomes. A critical knowledge gap in forest restoration planning is how to predict where natural forest regrowth is likely to lead to high levels of biodiversity recovery, which is an indicator of conservation value and the potential provisioning of diverse ecosystem services. We sought to predict and map landscape-scale recovery of species richness and total abundance of vertebrates, invertebrates, and plants in tropical and subtropical second-growth forests to inform spatial restoration planning. First, we conducted a global meta-analysis to quantify the extent to which recovery of species richness and total abundance in second-growth forests deviated from biodiversity values in reference old-growth forests in the same landscape. Second, we employed a machine-learning algorithm and a comprehensive set of socioenvironmental factors to spatially predict landscape-scale deviation and map it. Models explained on average 34% of observed variance in recovery (range 9–51%). Landscape-scale biodiversity recovery in second-growth forests was spatially predicted based on socioenvironmental landscape factors (human demography, land use and cover, anthropogenic and natural disturbance, ecosystem productivity, and topography and soil chemistry); was significantly higher for species richness than for total abundance for vertebrates (median range-adjusted predicted deviation 0.09 vs. 0.34) and invertebrates (0.2 vs. 0.35) but not for plants (which showed a similar recovery for both metrics [0.24 vs. 0.25]); and was positively correlated for total abundance of plant and vertebrate species (Pearson r = 0.45, p = 0.001). Our approach can help identify tropical and subtropical forest landscapes with high potential for biodiversity recovery through natural forest regrowth.     

Protecting biodiversity and economic returns in resource-rich tropical forests

In pursuit of socioeconomic development, many countries are expanding oil and mineral extraction into tropical forests. These activities seed access to remote, biologically rich areas, thereby endangering global biodiversity. We examined how protection of biodiversity and economic revenues can be balanced in biologically valuable regions. Using spatial data on oil profits and predicted species and ecosystem extents, we optimized the protection of 741 terrestrial species and 20 ecosystems of the Ecuadorian Amazon across a range of opportunity costs (i.e., sacrifices of extractive profit). We also applied spatial statistics to remotely sensed, historic deforestation data to focus the optimization on areas most threatened by imminent forest loss. Giving up 5% of a year's oil profits (US$221 million) allowed for a protected area network that retained an average of 65% of the extent of each species and ecosystem. This performance far exceeded that of the network produced by simple optimization for land area (which required a sacrifice of approximately 40% of annual oil profits [US$1.7 billion]) and used only marginally less land to achieve equivalent levels of ecological protection. We identified what we call emergency conservation targets: regions that are essential components of a cost-effective conservation reserve network but at imminent risk of destruction, thus requiring urgent and effective protection. Governments can use our methods when evaluating extractive-led development options to responsibly manage the associated ecological and economic trade-offs and protect natural capital.     

Safeguarding Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services in the Little Karoo,South Africa

Abstract: Global declines in biodiversity and the widespread degradation of ecosystem services have led to urgent calls to safeguard both. Responses to this urgency include calls to integrate the needs of ecosystem services and biodiversity into the design of conservation interventions. The benefits of such integration are purported to include improvements in the justification and resources available for these interventions. Nevertheless, additional costs and potential trade‐offs remain poorly understood in the design of interventions that seek to conserve biodiversity and ecosystem services. We sought to investigate the synergies and trade‐offs in safeguarding ecosystem services and biodiversity in South Africa's Little Karoo. We used data on three ecosystem services—carbon storage, water recharge, and fodder provision—and data on biodiversity to examine several conservation planning scenarios. First, we investigated the amount of each ecosystem service captured incidentally by a conservation plan to meet targets for biodiversity only while minimizing opportunity costs. We then examined the costs of adding targets for ecosystem services into this conservation plan. Finally, we explored trade‐offs between biodiversity and ecosystem service targets at a fixed cost. At least 30% of each ecosystem service was captured incidentally when all of biodiversity targets were met. By including data on ecosystem services, we increased the amount of services captured by at least 20% for all three services without additional costs. When biodiversity targets were reduced by 8%, an extra 40% of fodder provision and water recharge were obtained and 58% of carbon could be captured for the same cost. The opportunity cost (in terms of forgone production) of safeguarding 100% of the biodiversity targets was about US$500 million. Our results showed that with a small decrease in biodiversity target achievement, substantial gains for the conservation of ecosystem services can be achieved within our biodiversity priority areas for no extra cost.     

Rethinking Tropical Forest Conservation: Perils in Parks

Abstract: According to some conservationists, large, pristine, uninhabited parks are the defining criterion of success in conserving tropical forests. They argue that human residents in tropical forests inevitably deplete populations of large animals through hunting, which triggers a chain reaction of ecological events that greatly diminish the conservation value of these forests. Hence, they believe that removal of people from tropical forests is an essential step in the creation of successful parks and in the conservation of nature in the tropics. This approach can lead to undesirable consequences, however. Forest residents—and rural people generally—are potent political actors in tropical forest regions and an essential component of the environmental political constituencies that are necessary for the long-term conservation of tropical forests. In Amazonia and elsewhere, rural people are defending far bigger areas of tropical forest from unfettered deforestation and logging than are parks, thereby conserving the ecological services provided by these forests and the majority of their component plant and animal species. Moreover, the data are too sparse to judge the effects of forest peoples on populations of large forest animals. The establishment of pristine, tropical forest parks is an important conservation goal, but the exclusive pursuit of this goal undermines the broader objectives of conservation when it identifies forest residents and other rural people as the enemies of nature.     

Hydroelectricity production and forest conservation in watersheds.

Globally, particularly in developing countries, hydroelectricity production and economic growth occur together with ecosystem/biodiversity conservation in watersheds. There is a relationship between hydroelectricity production and ecosystem/biodiversity conservation in watersheds, centering on the supply and demand for ecosystem services of river water flow regulation and sediment retention. Here we show that, in the upper reach of the Yangtze River, hydroelectricity production of Three Gorges Hydroelectric Power Plant can form a beneficial relationship with forest conservation through the paid use (compensating residents for their cooperation in the conservation) of ecosystem services launched by the National Natural Forest Protection Project. This interaction can provide additional incentives to encourage local communities' long-term cooperation in conserving and protecting the restored forest ecosystems. Hydroelectricity plants also obtain benefits from this interaction. The industrialization of ecosystem services supply provides an operational framework for this beneficial interaction. Sustainable forest ecosystem conservation will require developing new institutions and policies and must involve local communities in the conservation and protection of their local forests.     

Effects of land use,cover, and protection on stream and riparian ecosystem services and biodiversity

Protected areas are an important part of broader landscapes that are often used to preserve biodiversity or natural features. Some argue that protected areas may also help ensure provision of ecosystem services. However, the effect of protection on ecosystem services and whether protection affects the provision of ecosystem services is known only for a few services in a few types of landscapes. We sought to fill this gap by investigating the effect of watershed protection status and land use and land cover on biodiversity and the provision of ecosystem services. We compared the ecosystem services provided in and around streams in 4 watershed types: International Union for Conservation of Nature category II protected forests, unprotected forests, unprotected forests with recent timber harvesting, and unprotected areas with agriculture. We surveyed 28 streams distributed across these watershed types in Quebec, Canada, to quantify provisioning of clean water, carbon storage, recreation, wild foods, habitat quality, and terrestrial and aquatic biodiversity richness and abundance. The quantity and quality of ecosystem services and biodiversity were generally higher in sites with intact forest—whether protected or not—relative to those embedded in production landscapes with forestry or agriculture. Clean-water provision, carbon storage, habitat quality, and tree diversity were significantly higher in and around streams surrounded by forest. Recreation, wild foods, and aquatic biodiversity did not vary among watershed types. Although some services can be provided by both protected and unprotected areas, protection status may help secure the continued supply of services sensitive to changes in land use or land cover. Our findings provide needed information about the ecosystem service and biodiversity trade-offs and synergies that result from developing a watershed or from protecting it.     

Conserving the abundance of nonthreatened species

Human modification of the environment is driving declines in population size and distributional extent of much of the world's biota. These declines extend to many of the most abundant and widespread species, for which proportionally small declines can result in the loss of vast numbers of individuals, biomass, and interactions. These losses could have major localized effects on ecological and cultural processes and services without elevating a species’ global extinction risk. Although most conservation effort is directed at species threatened with extinction in the very near term, the value of retaining abundance regardless of global extinction risk is justifiable based on many biodiversity or ecosystem service metrics, including cultural services, at scales from local to global. The challenges of identifying conservation priorities for widespread and abundant species include quantifying the effects of species’ abundance on services and understanding how these effects are realized as populations decline. Negative effects of population declines may be disconnected from the threat processes driving declines because of species movements and environment flows (e.g., hydrology). Conservation prioritization for these species shares greater similarity with invasive species risk assessments than extinction risk assessments because of the importance of local context and per capita effects of abundance on other species. Because conservation priorities usually focus on preventing the extinction of threatened species, the rationale and objectives for incorporating declines of nonthreatened species must be clearly articulated, going beyond extinction risk to encompass the range of likely harmful effects (e.g., secondary extinctions, loss of ecosystem services) if declines persist or are not reversed. Research should focus on characterizing the effects of local declines in species that are not threatened globally across a range of ecosystem services and quantifying the spatial distribution of these effects through the distribution of abundance. The case for conserving abundance in nonthreatened species can be made most powerfully when the costs of losing this abundance are better understood.     

Minimizing opportunity costs to aquatic connectivity restoration while controlling an invasive species

Controlling invasive species is critical for conservation but can have unintended consequences for native species and divert resources away from other efforts. This dilemma occurs on a grand scale in the North American Great Lakes, where dams and culverts block tributary access to habitat of desirable fish species and are a lynchpin of long‐standing efforts to limit ecological damage inflicted by the invasive, parasitic sea lamprey (Petromyzon marinus). Habitat restoration and sea‐lamprey control create conflicting goals for managing aging infrastructure. We used optimization to minimize opportunity costs of habitat gains for 37 desirable migratory fishes that arose from restricting sea lamprey access (0–25% increase) when selecting barriers for removal under a limited budget (US$1–105 million). Imposing limits on sea lamprey habitat reduced gains in tributary access for desirable species by 15–50% relative to an unconstrained scenario. Additional investment to offset the effect of limiting sea‐lamprey access resulted in high opportunity costs for 30 of 37 species (e.g., an additional US$20–80 million for lake sturgeon [Acipenser fulvescens]) and often required ≥5% increase in sea‐lamprey access to identify barrier‐removal solutions adhering to the budget and limiting access. Narrowly distributed species exhibited the highest opportunity costs but benefited more at less cost when small increases in sea‐lamprey access were allowed. Our results illustrate the value of optimization in limiting opportunity costs when balancing invasion control against restoration benefits for diverse desirable species. Such trade‐off analyses are essential to the restoration of connectivity within fragmented rivers without unleashing invaders.     

Modeling the forest transition: forest scarcity and ecosystem service hypotheses.

An historical generalization about forest cover change in which rapid deforestation gives way over time to forest restoration is called "the forest transition." Prior research on the forest transition leaves three important questions unanswered: (1) How does forest loss influence an individual landowner's incentives to reforest? (2) How does the forest recovery rate affect the likelihood of forest transition? (3) What happens after the forest transition occurs? The purpose of this paper is to develop a minimum model of the forest transition to answer these questions. We assume that deforestation caused by landowners' decisions and forest regeneration initiated by agricultural abandonment have aggregated effects that characterize entire landscapes. These effects include feedback mechanisms called the "forest scarcity" and "ecosystem service" hypotheses. In the forest scarcity hypothesis, forest losses make forest products scarcer, which increases the economic value of forests. In the ecosystem service hypothesis, the environmental degradation that accompanies the loss of forests causes the value of ecosystem services provided by forests to decline. We examined the impact of each mechanism on the likelihood of forest transition through an investigation of the equilibrium and stability of landscape dynamics. We found that the forest transition occurs only when landowners employ a low rate of future discounting. After the forest transition, regenerated forests are protected in a sustainable way if forests regenerate slowly. When forests regenerate rapidly, the forest scarcity hypothesis expects instability in which cycles of large-scale deforestation followed by forest regeneration repeatedly characterize the landscape. In contrast, the ecosystem service hypothesis predicts a catastrophic shift from a forested to an abandoned landscape when the amount of deforestation exceeds the critical level, which can lead to a resource degrading poverty trap. These findings imply that incentives for forest conservation seem stronger in settings where forests regenerate slowly as well as when decision makers value the future.     

Landscape trajectory of natural boreal forest loss as an impediment to green infrastructure

Loss of natural forests by forest clearcutting has been identified as a critical conservation challenge worldwide. This study addressed forest fragmentation and loss in the context of the establishment of a functional green infrastructure as a spatiotemporally connected landscape-scale network of habitats enhancing biodiversity, favorable conservation status, and ecosystem services. Through retrospective analysis of satellite images, we assessed a 50- to 60-year spatiotemporal clearcutting impact trajectory on natural and near-natural boreal forests across a sizable and representative region from the Gulf of Bothnia to the Scandinavian Mountain Range in northern Fennoscandia. This period broadly covers the whole forest clearcutting period; thus, our approach and results can be applied to comprehensive impact assessment of industrial forest management. The entire study region covers close to 46,000 km² of forest-dominated landscape in a late phase of transition from a natural or near-natural to a land-use modified state. We found a substantial loss of intact forest, in particular of large, contiguous areas, a spatial polarization of remaining forest on regional scale where the inland has been more severely affected than the mountain and coastal zones, and a pronounced impact on interior forest core areas. Salient results were a decrease in area of the largest intact forest patch from 225,853 to 68,714 ha in the mountain zone and from 257,715 to 38,668 ha in the foothills zone, a decrease from 75% to 38% intact forest in the inland zones, a decrease in largest patch core area (assessed by considering 100-m patch edge disturbance) from 6114 to 351 ha in the coastal zone, and a geographic imbalance in protected forest with an evident predominance in the mountain zone. These results demonstrate profound disturbance of configuration of the natural forest landscape and disrupted connectivity, which challenges the establishment of functional green infrastructure. Our approach supports the identification of forests for expanded protection and conservation-oriented forest landscape restoration.     

Economic and Ecological Outcomes of Flexible Biodiversity Offset Systems

The commonly expressed goal of biodiversity offsets is to achieve no net loss of specific biological features affected by development. However, strict equivalency requirements may complicate trading of offset credits, increase costs due to restricted offset placement options, and force offset activities to focus on features that may not represent regional conservation priorities. Using the oil sands industry of Alberta, Canada, as a case study, we evaluated the economic and ecological performance of alternative offset systems targeting either ecologically equivalent areas (vegetation types) or regional conservation priorities (caribou and the Dry Mixedwood natural subregion). Exchanging dissimilar biodiversity elements requires assessment via a generalized metric; we used an empirically derived index of biodiversity intactness to link offsets with losses incurred by development. We considered 2 offset activities: land protection, with costs estimated as the net present value of profits of petroleum and timber resources to be paid as compensation to resource tenure holders, and restoration of anthropogenic footprint, with costs estimated from existing restoration projects. We used the spatial optimization tool MARXAN to develop hypothetical offset networks that met either the equivalent‐vegetation or conservation‐priority targets. Networks that required offsetting equivalent vegetation cost 2–17 times more than priority‐focused networks. This finding calls into question the prudence of equivalency‐based systems, particularly in relatively undeveloped jurisdictions, where conservation focuses on limiting and directing future losses. Priority‐focused offsets may offer benefits to industry and environmental stakeholders by allowing for lower‐cost conservation of valued ecological features and may invite discussion on what land‐use trade‐offs are acceptable when trading biodiversity via offsets. Resultados Económicos y Ecológicos de Sistemas de Compensación de Biodiversidad Flexible Habib et al.     

Effects of human demand on conservation planning for biodiversity and ecosystem services

Safeguarding ecosystem services and biodiversity is critical to achieving sustainable development. To date, ecosystem services quantification has focused on the biophysical supply of services with less emphasis on human beneficiaries (i.e., demand). Only when both occur do ecosystems benefit people, but demand may shift ecosystem service priorities toward human-dominated landscapes that support less biodiversity. We quantified how accounting for demand affects the efficiency of conservation in capturing both human benefits and biodiversity by comparing conservation priorities identified with and without accounting for demand. We mapped supply and benefit for 3 ecosystem services (flood mitigation, crop pollination, and nature-based recreation) by adapting existing ecosystem service models to include and exclude factors representing human demand. We then identified conservation priorities for each with the conservation planning program Marxan. Particularly for flood mitigation and crop pollination, supply served as a poor proxy for benefit because demand changed the spatial distribution of ecosystem service provision. Including demand when jointly targeting biodiversity and ecosystem service increased the efficiency of conservation efforts targeting ecosystem services without reducing biodiversity outcomes. Our results highlight the importance of incorporating demand when quantifying ecosystem services for conservation planning.     

The Role of Prices in Conserving Critical Natural Capital

Abstract: Until recent decades, economic decision makers have largely ignored the nonmarket benefits provided by nature, resulting in unprecedented threats to ecological life‐support functions. The economic challenge today is to decide how much ecosystem structure can be converted to economic production and how much must be conserved to provide essential ecosystem services. Many economists and a growing number of life scientists hope to address this challenge by estimating the marginal value of environmental benefits and then using this information to make economic decisions. I assessed this approach first by examining the role and effectiveness of the price mechanism in a well‐functioning market economy, second by identifying the issues that prevent markets from pricing many ecological benefits, and third by focusing on problems inherent to valuing services generated by complex and poorly understood ecosystems subject to irreversible change. I then focus on critical natural capital (CNC), which generates benefits that are essential to human welfare and have few if any substitutes. When imminent ecological thresholds threaten CNC, conservation is essential and marginal valuation becomes inappropriate. Once conservation needs have been met, remaining ecosystem structure is potentially available for economic production. Demand for this available supply will determine prices. In other words, conservation needs should be price determining, not price determined. Conservation science must help identify CNC and the quantity and quality of ecosystem structure required to ensure its sustained provision.     

Linking deforestation scenarios to pollination services and economic returns in coffee agroforestry systems.

The ecological and economic consequences of rain forest conversion and fragmentation for biodiversity, ecosystem functioning, and ecosystem services like protection of soils, water retention, pollination, or biocontrol are poorly understood. In human-dominated tropical landscapes, forest remnants may provide ecosystem services and act as a source for beneficial organisms immigrating into adjacent annual and perennial agro-ecosystems. In this study, we use empirical data on the negative effects of increasing forest distance on both pollinator diversity and fruit set of coffee to estimate future changes in pollination services for different land use scenarios in Sulawesi, Indonesia. Spatially explicit land use simulations demonstrate that depending on the magnitude and location of ongoing forest conversion, pollination services are expected to decline continuously and thus directly reduce coffee yields by up to 18%, and net revenues per hectare up to 14% within the next two decades (compared to average yields of the year 2001). Currently, forests in the study area annually provide pollination services worth 46 Euros per hectare. However, our simulations also revealed a potential win-win constellation, in which ecological and economic values can be preserved, if patches of forests (or other natural vegetation) are maintained in the agricultural landscape, which could be a viable near future option for local farmers and regional land use planners.     

Minimizing the Cost of Keeping Options Open for Conservation in a Changing Climate

Policy documents advocate that managers should keep their options open while planning to protect coastal ecosystems from climate‐change impacts. However, the actual costs and benefits of maintaining flexibility remain largely unexplored, and alternative approaches for decision making under uncertainty may lead to better joint outcomes for conservation and other societal goals. For example, keeping options open for coastal ecosystems incurs opportunity costs for developers. We devised a decision framework that integrates these costs and benefits with probabilistic forecasts for the extent of sea‐level rise to find a balance between coastal ecosystem protection and moderate coastal development. Here, we suggest that instead of keeping their options open managers should incorporate uncertain sea‐level rise predictions into a decision‐making framework that evaluates the benefits and costs of conservation and development. In our example, based on plausible scenarios for sea‐level rise and assuming a risk‐neutral decision maker, we found that substantial development could be accommodated with negligible loss of environmental assets. Characterization of the Pareto efficiency of conservation and development outcomes provides valuable insight into the intensity of trade‐offs between development and conservation. However, additional work is required to improve understanding of the consequences of alternative spatial plans and the value judgments and risk preferences of decision makers and stakeholders. Minimizando el Costo de Mantener Opciones Abiertas para la Conservación en un Clima Cambiante     

Synergies and trade-offs among integrated conservation approaches in Mexico

Integrated conservation approaches (ICAs) are employed by governments, communities, and nongovernmental organizations worldwide seeking to achieve outcomes with dual benefits for biodiversity conservation and poverty alleviation. Although ICAs are frequently implemented concurrently, interactions among ICAs and the synergies or trade-offs that result are rarely considered during program design, implementation, and evaluation. In support of more deliberate and effective use of ICAs, we examined interactions among four well-known strategies: biosphere reserves (BRs), voluntary protected areas (VPAs), payments for ecosystem services (PES), and community forest management (CFM). Through a comparative case study, we analyzed interactions among spatially or temporally clustered ICAs implemented on communally held and managed lands in three ecologically and socioeconomically distinct regions of Mexico. Our research methods combined policy analysis with data gathered through participant observation and semistructured interviews (n = 78) and focus groups (n = 5) with government officials, implementers, and participants involved in ICAs in 28 communities. Despite the significant differences among the regions in which they were implemented, we found that key actors at each level of involvement generally perceived interactions among ICAs as synergistic. The PES programs were perceived to strengthen protected areas by reducing forest cover loss in and around BRs, fostering proconservation attitudes, and incentivizing the establishment of VPAs. Communities that invested PES income in CFM were motivated to conserve forests beyond the duration of PES programs, and CFM in buffer zones was perceived to strengthen BRs by maintaining forest cover and generating income for communities. We also identified key social and environmental factors that can influence these interaction effects among ICAs. Based on these findings, we recommend further study of ICA interactions and intentionally complementary policy design to maximize positive environmental and social outcomes.     

Global justice and the opportunity costs of conservation

Opportunity costs can represent a significant portion of the costs associated with conservation projects and frequently outstrip other kinds of cost. They are typically understood to refer to the benefits someone would have obtained if conservation projects had not required them to give up current activities, such as farming or hunting or if the land had been available for uses other than conservation. This familiar way of identifying opportunity costs is flawed, however, because it threatens to condone, or take advantage of, the injustices that many people face that affect their opportunities. I integrated ideas from the political theory of global justice to examine how the analysis of opportunity costs illustrates the importance of considering conservation and issues of global justice together, rather than thinking about them in isolation. I distinguish four baselines for defining opportunity costs. A status quo baseline defines opportunity costs by asking what people would have earned had a conservation project not happened. A willingness to accept baseline defines them by asking people what it would take to make them indifferent to whether a conservation project takes place or not. An antipoverty baseline suggests that opportunity costs have been met when people affected by a project are not left in poverty. An egalitarian baseline suggests opportunity costs have been met when people are not left in relative disadvantage, with worse than average opportunities. I argue that the egalitarian baseline is the most acceptable from the point of view of justice. Such a baseline would suggest that, in practice, many of the world's poor are being unjustly treated, or even exploited, as a result of conservation activities.     

鼎湖山南亚热带森林生态系统服务价值动态

以鼎湖山3个南亚热带森林演替典型阶段生态系统为对象,采用我国《森林生态系统服务功能评估规范》（LY/T 1721—2008）标准化计算公式与服务价格,量化揭示南亚热带森林生态系统演替过程中生态系统服务功能价值动态。结果表明：随着演替的进行,南亚热带森林生态系统服务功能总价值不断增大;但各分项服务功能价值则表现出不同的动态规律与变化幅度,从而使得森林生态系统服务结构呈现非线性演化特征。在南亚热带森林生态系统演替的早期阶段,生态系统服务价值的最大组分是涵养水源的功能价值,而中、后期则是保育土壤。人工林营造可以有效增强区域生态系统的水源涵养能力,而保育演替中、后期森林则对于大气CO2收和土壤保育而言尤为重要。