Integrated assessments of payments for ecosystem services programs

Ecosystems provide crucial services such as clean water to humans. Numerous payments for ecosystem services (PES) programs have been implemented around the world. However, their socioeconomic and environmental consequences are rarely quantified simultaneously. In PNAS, Zheng et al. (1) present an insightful empirical analysis of socioeconomic and environmental effects of a PES program that supplies drinking water to ∼20 million residents in Beijing, China. The work also brings ecosystem service research closer to fully account for the pros and cons of PES programs, laying important groundwork to quantify telecouplings—socioeconomic and environmental interactions over distances (2).