An Evaluation of Payment for Ecosystem Service models implemented in Areas of Rural Poverty in China, Rwanda, Zimbabwe, and Mexico

Poor communities living in rural areas have complicated and essential relationships to the environment in which they live. Such communities often live in degraded ecosystems where natural disasters and climate change incur systematic and largescale damage to communities. Income earning potential most often comes from agriculture and from ecosystem services, which are gathered or farmed products such as timber, clean water, plant material, and wildlife that are farmed and sold. Driven by survival needs or poor government management, these activities are often practiced using unsustainable methods that cause further harm to degraded landscapes. To combat this phenomenon, and to tackle the exceptionally large goals of improving economic livelihood for rural poor communities while conserving diverse ecosystems, several largescale policy programs have been implemented in multiple developing nations around the world. Most of these programs including components of payment for ecosystem service models (PES), which compensate communities in various ways for harvesting and selling forest products such as timber, water, and wildlife. This paper reviews four such programs: RFFP in China, a wetlands payment for ecosystem services structure in Rwanda, CAMPFIRE in Zimbabwe, and REDD+ in Mexico. It identifies pros and cons of each and begins to make broad recommendations about efficacy of such programs. Recommendations center around ensuring effective land use policy, utilizing communitybased program management, promoting land ownership at a community level, and a balancing of forest conservation and economic activities.