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Rural Household Preferences for Active Participation in “Payment for Ecosystem Service” Programs: A Case in the Miyun Reservoir Catchment, China

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  • Hao Li
  • Michael T Bennett
  • Xuemei Jiang
  • Kebin Zhang
  • Xiaohui Yang

Abstract

Many payment for ecosystem services (PES) programs, such as the Slope Land Conversion Program (SLCP), are passive and require full participation by impacted households. In contrast, this study considers the alternative of “active and incomplete” participation in PES programs, in which participants are not obliged to contract their own land, and have the right to select into the program or not. This type of program has been popular over the last decade in China; however, there have been few studies on the characteristics of willingness to participate and implementation. As such, this paper uses the Choice Experiment (CE) method to explore ways for inducing effective program participation, by analyzing the effects of different regime attributes. The case study used to analyze participation utility was the Jing-Ji Afforestation Program for Ecological and Water Protection (JAPEWP), a typical active-participation forestry PES program, and a key source of water near Beijing in the Miyun Reservoir Catchment (MRC). Analyzing rural household survey data indicated that the program faces a variety of challenges, including long-term maintenance, implementation performance, cost-effectiveness, and monitoring approaches. There are also challenges with one-size-fits-all payment strategies, due to ineffective program participation or imperfect implementation regimes. In response, this study proposes several policies, including providing secure and complete land tenure to the participants, creating more local off-farm employment opportunities, designing performance-based monitoring systems that are integrated with financial incentives, applying differentiated payment strategies, providing capacity building to support forestation activities, and establishing a comprehensive implementation regime that would address these challenges. These policy conclusions provide valuable lessons for other active-participation PES programs as well.

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  • Hao Li & Michael T Bennett & Xuemei Jiang & Kebin Zhang & Xiaohui Yang, 2017. "Rural Household Preferences for Active Participation in “Payment for Ecosystem Service” Programs: A Case in the Miyun Reservoir Catchment, China," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(1), pages 1-21, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0169483
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0169483
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    1. Chen, Cheng & Matzdorf, Bettina & Meyer, Claas & König, Hannes & Zhen, Lin, 2018. "How socioeconomic and institutional conditions at the household level shape the environmental effectiveness of governmental PES: China’s Sloping Land Conversion Program," SocArXiv jzvqh, Center for Open Science.
    2. Hao Li & Xiaohui Yang & Xiao Zhang & Yuyan Liu & Kebin Zhang, 2018. "Estimation of Rural Households’ Willingness to Accept Two PES Programs and Their Service Valuation in the Miyun Reservoir Catchment, China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(1), pages 1-19, January.
    3. Sheng, Jichuan & Qiu, Hong & Zhang, Sanfeng, 2019. "Opportunity cost, income structure, and energy structure for landholders participating in payments for ecosystem services: Evidence from Wolong National Nature Reserve, China," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 230-238.

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