An article based on work in SINCERE has led to some interesting published discussion on Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES) in the journal Nature Sustainability.

The original paper From principles to practice in paying for nature’s services, led to a critical response from Esteve Corbera (UAB) and his collaborators (Wells et al.)  who wrote to defend simplified PES designs and called for further consideration of social-ecological context and drivers of environmental interventions and behaviour.

EFI Principal Scientist and SINCERE project consortium member, Sven Wunder, led a reply from the original researcher team addressing in turn PES technical design, equity concerns and impacts, while finally raising a concern about environmentally inefficient PES schemes which, though still providing income support and welfare benefits to contractors, may affect service users’ willingness to pay.

The paired peer review exchange is now published in Nature Sustainability and makes for a fascinating exploration of issues to consider in the effectiveness of PES initiatives.