Residents’ willingness to pay for ecosystem services and its influencing factors: A study of the Xin’an River basin

Interventional Impacts of Watershed Ecological Compensation on Regional Economic Differences: Evidence from Xin’an River, China

“…The Xin’an River is an important ecological security barrier and strategic water source for the Yangtze River Delta in China. In the 1990s, the water quality became increasingly eutrophic downstream of Qiandao Lake [ 31 ]. The discrepancy also deepened between the need to protect water resources and economic growth in the upstream and downstream regions.…”

“…The discrepancy also deepened between the need to protect water resources and economic growth in the upstream and downstream regions. In order to address these issues and promote regional sustainable development, the provincial governments of Anhui and Zhejiang signed the “Agreement on Water Environmental Compensation for Xin’an River Basin” in 2012 [ 31 ]. This was the first trans-provincial EC pilot in China and the lateral EC mode for a domestic watershed was also created.…”

Integrating Ecosystem Services Supply, Demand and Flow in Ecological Compensation: A Case Study of Carbon Sequestration Services

“…Payments for ecosystem services (PES) provide a flexible approach to problem-solving that can transform uncompensated externalities into economic incentives that are important for protecting ecosystems, coordinating regional development, and achieving the SDGs [10][11][12][13]. PES has been scaled up globally to enable sustainable management of ecosystem services [14][15][16][17][18][19]. As of 2017, there are more than 550 global PES schemes with an annual transaction value of $36-42 billion [20], covering a wide range of ecosystems such as water [21], forests [22,23], agricultural land [24], and oceans [25].…”

“…At present, the mainstream approach to EC in China is the establishment of EC funds, which are co-financed by stakeholders to implement compensation payments. For example, China's first cross-provincial watershed EC fund (the Xin'an River Basin Water Environment Compensation Fund) was established with 300 million yuan from the central government and 100 million yuan from each of Anhui and Zhejiang provinces [17]. However, the current EC standard is based on the financial capacity of local governments and is decided by high-level government agencies after a mutual game.…”

“…However, the current EC standard is based on the financial capacity of local governments and is decided by high-level government agencies after a mutual game. The lack of clear EC standards among stakeholders, the lack of sufficient scientific basis for the funding ratio, and the lack of more detailed scientific research on the scope of EC have caused major flaws in the design of the EC scheme for the water environment in the Xin'an River Basin [17,38]. In the existing EC scheme, the ambiguity of the scope and amount of benefits usually leads to conflicts among stakeholders.…”