Water-Related Payment Schemes for Forest Ecosystem Services in Selected Southeast European (SEE) Countries

This paper examines the level of payment for ecosystem services (PES) concept implementation in the financing of water-related forest ecosystem services (ES) in the Republic of Croatia, the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (FB&H), the Republic of Slovenia, and the Republic of Serbia. The focus is on water-related forest ES recognised by the millennium ecosystem assessment (MEA). For the purpose of this paper, the term pure PES describes schemes that comply to all five conditions set by Wunder definition and term PES like for those schemes that miss some of those conditions. In the first step, the most important legislative documents related to forests, water, and environmental protection were selected. The second consists of a content analysis; focusing on the definition of ES; the definition of fees or payments; the establishment of ‘forest funds’, ‘water funds’, or ‘environmental funds’; and the way these funds were spent. Here we looked at the flow of funding into the forestry sector recognising forest management as the main water-related forest ES provider. Research revealed existence of well-established payments schemes in forestry in Croatia for almost 30 years and in FB&H for some 20 years which were assessed as closest to pure PES. In Serbia and Slovenia, there were no PES or PES like schemes in the forestry sector. In the water sector the well-established PES like payments schemes existing in all four countries. The environmental protection sector, however, rely more on the tax like rather than on the PES like schemes. Legislation in general recognised the link between forests and water, but this was much more evident in the forestry than in the water or environment sector. The role of the state is strongly pronounced in all countries studied, and was the main driving force behind all payments. However, this position of the state represents also the main obstacle for the development of pure PES schemes, together with underdeveloped private forestry and complex socio-economic conditions. Nevertheless, there is room for further development of pure PES and PES like schemes based on EU or global experiences.

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Stakeholders’ Opinions towards Water-Related Forests Ecosystem Services in Selected Southeast European Countries (Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Slovenia and Serbia)

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su132112001 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (21) ◽

pp. 12001

Author(s):

Dijana Vuletić ◽

Silvija Krajter Ostoić ◽

Klára Báliková ◽

Mersudin Avdibegović ◽

Kristina Potočki ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Water Management ◽

Ecosystem Services ◽

Bosnia And Herzegovina ◽

Forest Ecosystem ◽

Trade Offs ◽

Role Of The State ◽

Forest Ecosystem Services ◽

Payment Schemes ◽

High Level

Even though water-related forest ecosystem services are important for forestry and water management sectors, they have different definitions and are regulated differently in each sector, which makes them poorly recognized. How stakeholders from two main sectors (forestry and water management) perceive the importance of water-related forest ecosystem services, the trade-offs between ecosystem services and the effectiveness and implementation of payments schemes related to forest water ecosystem services were our areas of interest. We have conduct surveys with different groups of stakeholders from both sectors in four selected countries (the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Slovenia and Serbia) with a lot of similarities and the potential to learn from each other. The results show that in spite of the spotted differences among analyzed countries, there is a high level of agreement among respondents on all investigated aspects. In addition, even though different payment schemes exist in three of four countries, stakeholders are rarely aware of their existence, or it is better to say that they do not recognize them as payment schemes for ecosystem services because of their names and definitions, which do not clearly define ecosystem services. Mostly, they use bundled services and non-voluntary payments and are designed and implemented by the states. Due to the strong role of states and the low transparency in the existing schemes, we looked at possible conditions reflected through stakeholders’ opinions for overcoming that obstacle for the development of new payment schemes. We found that there is a high level of acceptance of payments schemes as more effective than “command and control” schemes and of the involvement of other stakeholders in decision-making processes as those conditions that can positively influence development of new payment schemes in all four countries. These results give us hope that in spite of the strong role of the state in selected countries, the role of stakeholders will be more acknowledged and, by that, the future schemes will be more harmonized among the sectors and their goals and needs, contributing to its effectiveness as well.

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Structural model of forest ecosystem services’ payment for water quality improvement

SIMI 2019, Abstract Book - International Symposium "The Environmental and The Industry" ◽

10.21698/simi.2019.fp31 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 238-245

Author(s):

Mariyana Lybenova ◽

Alexandre Chikalanov ◽

Yulian Petkov

Keyword(s):

Quality Improvement ◽

Ecosystem Services ◽

Structural Model ◽

Use Case ◽

Forest Ecosystem Services ◽

Payment Schemes ◽

Structured Information ◽

Definition Of ◽

Meta Analyses ◽

Web Platform

The publication deals with the development of a structural model of payment schemes for ecosystem services (PES) oriented to usage of forests for water, soil and microclimate quality improvement. Proposed structural model is built on the Meta analyses base of more than 50 PES schemes worldwide. The proposed structural model has three top down levels – groups of categories, categories and attributes. There are seven groups of categories, 17 categories and more than 120 attributes. The structured information about studied PES schemes is stored in a warehouse managed by unique web platform created by the authors. An important part presented study is the developed generic use case of PES schemes with definition of seven participated actors.

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ASP FISH -AN EXAMPLE FOR RAPPROCHEMENT OF "LEGAL AREAS"ON LAKE BALKHASH

EurasianUnionScientists ◽

10.31618/esu.2413-9335.2020.10.73.721 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 10 (4(73)) ◽

pp. 39-44

Author(s):

S.A. Pavlova ◽

I.E. Pavlov ◽

O.O. Shelepova

Keyword(s):

Environmental Management ◽

Environmental Protection ◽

Terrestrial Ecosystems ◽

The State ◽

Recreational Fishing ◽

Role Of The State ◽

Lake Balkhash ◽

The Republic ◽

Sustainable Population

In the Balkhash basin, an independent sustainable population of asp fish has formed, which is of great importance in industrial and recreational fishing. In the Republic of Kazakhstan, Lake Balkhash is one of the main fishing reservoirs. In the last decade, this region has experienced a powerful diverse anthropogenic and technogenicimpact, which has led to significant negative changes in aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems. The role of the state in the regulation of environmental management and environmental protection.

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Trade-offs between three forest ecosystem services across the state of New Hampshire, USA: timber, carbon, and albedo

Ecological Applications ◽

10.1890/14-2207 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 26 (1) ◽

pp. 146-161 ◽

Cited By ~ 22

Author(s):

David A. Lutz ◽

Elizabeth A. Burakowski ◽

Mackenzie B. Murphy ◽

Mark E. Borsuk ◽

Rebecca M. Niemiec ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Ecosystem Services ◽

New Hampshire ◽

Forest Ecosystem ◽

The State ◽

Trade Offs ◽

Forest Ecosystem Services

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Towards the Legal Recognition and Governance of Forest Ecosystem Services in Mozambique

Potchefstroom Electronic Law Journal/Potchefstroomse Elektroniese Regsblad ◽

10.17159/1727-3781/2013/v16i2a2346 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 16 (2) ◽

pp. 121

Author(s):

Simon Norfolk ◽

Michaela Cosijn

Keyword(s):

Ecosystem Services ◽

Forest Ecosystem ◽

Well Being ◽

Legal Framework ◽

The State ◽

Adaptive Governance ◽

Legal Recognition ◽

Governance Regime ◽

Forest Ecosystem Services ◽

Cooperative Governance

Within the context of Mozambique, this paper examines the state of forest ecosystem services, the dependency of the population on these systems for their well-being, if an adaptive governance regime is being created which will ensure the resilience of the forest ecosystem services including the legal framework, the institutions operating within this framework, the tools available and their functioning, and how cooperative governance is operating.

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Methodological approaches to the valuation of forest ecosystem services: An overview of recent international research trends

Journal of Forest Science ◽

10.17221/13/2021-jfs ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 67 (No. 7) ◽

pp. 307-317

Author(s):

Caterina Patrizia Di Franco ◽

Gianmarco Lima ◽

Emanuele Schimmenti ◽

Antonio Asciuto

Keyword(s):

Ecosystem Services ◽

Forest Ecosystem ◽

Stated Preference ◽

Market Price ◽

Scientific Research ◽

Research Trends ◽

Cultural Services ◽

Forest Ecosystem Services ◽

Forestry Sector ◽

Provision Of Services

Forests represent the most important source of ecosystem services (ES) on a global level both for the production of goods and for the provision of services and externalities, nevertheless scientific research in the economic field is lacking. Currently the number of documents relating to ES is 16 673, of which only 1 379 concern the forestry sector. The aim of this study is to provide an overview of scientific research trends in the field of economic evaluation of forest ecosystem services (FES). To this end, an on-line bibliographic survey was carried out on the main scientific search engines, which made it possible to quantify the works and at the same time to detect the main evaluation methods used for the different FES. This survey allowed to collect 93 articles meeting the search criteria: the most active continents were Europe and Asia, whereas most of the articles focused on the joint evaluation of provisioning, regulation and cultural services, even if a good number of them only concerned cultural services. The most widely used valuation methodologies were the contingent valuation among the stated preference techniques and the market price among direct observation criteria.

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