Economic incentives

Livelihoods, Forests, and Conservation in Developing Countries: An Overview

BACKGROUND:

Poverty is a huge challenge, with 2.8 billion of the world’s 6 billion people living on less than $2 a day. The paper highlights the alarming extent of poverty in developing countries and addresses the rapid deforestation, which compromises ecological integrity and exacerbates social inequities. The authors focus on exploring whether poverty alleviation and forest conservation can be aligned as complementary rather than conflicting objectives.

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Cómo financiar la restauración de los bosques tropicales

Background

La restauración de bosques tropicales enfrenta desafíos económicos y sociales derivados de la presión sobre las tierras disponibles y la competencia con otras actividades como la agricultura y la ganadería. Sin embargo, la restauración ecológica se considera una oportunidad para recuperar ecosistemas degradados y generar beneficios económicos para los propietarios de tierras. El artículo analiza cómo financiar y hacer económicamente viable la restauración del bosque atlántico de Brasil, uno de los ecosistemas más biodiversos y amenazados del mundo. 

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Peasants, agroforesters, and anthropologists: A 20-year venture in income-generating trees and hedgerows in Haiti

Background

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Carbon sequestration in Africa: The land tenure problem

Background

Research on afforestation and reforestation projects highlights how tropical forests can store carbon on a large scale. Africa offers vast areas of suitable land for carbon sequestration through these initiatives. However, the author argues that land tenure issues in Africa create an obstacle to achieving this potential.

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The Effectiveness of Payments for Environmental Services

Background

The academic debate on how effectively Payments for Environmental Services (PES) achieve environmental and socioeconomic goals continues to grow. Researchers initially focused on defining the concept and documenting early field experiences. Over time, they shifted their attention to designing effective incentives, analyzing behavioral responses, conducting systematic reviews, and applying counterfactual-based impact evaluations to assess outcomes more rigorously.

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Committed to restoring tropical forests: an overview of Brazil's and Indonesia's restoration targets and policies

Background

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Leveraging the blue economy to transform marine forest restoration

Background

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Payments for ecosystem services and the fatal attraction of win-win solutions

Background

Payments for ecosystem services (PES) programs involve valuing and paying stewards of ecosystems for the services that these ecosystems create incentives for conserving them. These programs are sometimes characterized as ‘win-win’ solutions, with the potential to contribute to both biodiversity conservation and poverty reduction. The authors of this paper review the literature on PES programs and highlight some challenges of implementing them.

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The Little Book of Investing in Nature: A simple guide to financing life on earth

Background

The authors of this book point out that the international community has missed almost all collective biodiversity targets till date. Insufficient finance or the large gap between the funds that are required for biodiversity conservation and the funds that are allotted and the inappropriate implementation of existing finance mechanisms are part of the reason for the continued decline in global biodiversity. 

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Conservation Finance: A Framework

Background

The authors define conservation finance as “mechanisms and strategies that generate, manage, and deploy financial resources and align incentives to achieve nature conservation outcomes.” Governments are the largest contributors to conservation finance resources, and common mechanisms include grants, subsidies, and fiscal transfers, among others.

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