Preserve and produce: experience in implementing payments for environmental services in two indigenous communities in the Northern and Southern ranges of Oaxaca, Mexico

ABSTRACT

Payments for environmental services (PES) are conservation instruments in place in various Latin American countries. They are generally undergoing adjustment and implementation changes, and they are widely implemented in indigenous communities. This article aims to suggest a relevant group of context variables in PES implementation. Characterizing the local context of two indigenous communities located in Oaxaca, Mexico, and analyzing the relationship between the local context and PES implementation and outcomes perceptions.

The work is based on 75 surveys administered to beneficiary families of the instrument in the two localities. The results suggest three conclusions:

The pertinence of the nine focal variables: “Forest cover, Opportunity costs, Livelihoods, Trust and cooperation, Motivations toward conservation, Management practices, Internal organization, Land tenure and Rules for the management and use” to the characterization of the local context. And the relevance of the new focal variable “Presence and experience with Civil Society Organizations”.

The coincidence between the contextual variables and the determinants of the success of conservation instruments.

Finally, the incidence of “Trust and cooperation” and “Internal organization” in the implementation of equitable PES schemes. And the importance of linking sustainable production to PES conservation schemes.

KEYWORDS:

• Payments for ecosystem services
• local context
• indigenous communities

Acknowledgments

We give thanks to the community members of San Antonio del Barrio and San Juan Ozolotepec for sharing their PES experience with us. We acknowledge the Postdoctoral Fellowships Program of National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), the Coordination of Humanities and Social Research Institute.

Thank you to the National Problems Project No 246947 of the Mexican National Council for Science and Technology (CONACyT), led by Maria Perevochtchikova, for the fieldwork support. Thank you to Sophie Ávila, Elvira Duran, and Carolina Navarrete for their valuable help in data collection.

Thank you to Marco Antonio González from GAIA for the detail information provided. Thank you to Antonio Riveros for the valuable comments to improve the Tables and Figures. And thank you very much to the Reviewers for their comments and suggestions which enhanced the quality of the paper and finally, thank you to American Journal Experts for their translation services.

Notes

¹ Scheme denotes a single program with specific characteristics, conditions, rules, etc.

² For detailed information see McGinnis and Ostrom (2014).