Changing environment and development institutions to enable payments for ecosystem services: The role of institutional work

Payments for ecosystem services (PES) are increasingly promoted as nature-based solutions to climate, environmental, and business challenges. While participation in PES schemes is mandated in countries such as China, Costa Rica, and Vietnam, it remains unclear how PES schemes emerge in countries devoid of national mandates. This article investigates how actors have attempted institutional change to enable PES, by reinterpreting or adapting national laws, policies, and plans. We present an analytical framework theorising how geographical variations in (1) institutional frameworks, and (2) actor capabilities, dictate which institutions actors attempt to change. We then apply this framework to multi-scalar actors and institutions in Thailand and the Philippines. Our empirics reveal the types of institutional work that actors perform such as advocacy, education, mimicry, and networking, and demonstrate how this creates legal and discursive support, and improves stakeholder awareness and acceptance of PES as an environmental management strategy. Eight formal institutions are shown to have undergone change to enable PES across these countries, including those related to indigenous people, energy production, protected areas, pollution control, carbon offsetting, and decentralised governance. We show institutional change to be a geographical and contextual process that requires actors to match the right types of institutional work, with the right mechanism of institutional change, and a suitable target institution if they are to be successful in effecting change. Yet, we also report failed attempts, and explain how informal cultural norms act as challenges to formal institutional change. Through our comparative analysis of multiple institutions, actors, and national settings, we identify trends and make recommendations with global relevance to PES scholars and practitioners, and that can aid other initiatives that seek to address climate change and promote environmental sustainability.     

Importance of programme design for potential US domestic GHG offset supply and quality

Greenhouse gas (GHG) offsets are a central feature of most regional and national cap-and-trade systems. A greenhouse offset credit represents a tonne of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO₂e) reduced, avoided or sequestered by a project implemented specifically to compensate for emissions occurring elsewhere. Several existing modelling studies estimate the technically and economically achievable supply of GHG offsets from uncapped sources in the US. This analysis is among the few that consider how the design of offset protocols – and the corresponding rules for eligibility, measuring, verifying and awarding offsets – might impact actual offset crediting and the realization of GHG mitigation potential. The presented analysis demonstrates how rules for each of these factors could impact the supply of offset credits, as well as the emissions-reduction benefits of an offset programme. Findings indicate that although lenient offset rules and protocols may bring several times more credits to market than a conservative approach, these gains in offset supply would come at a significant cost to the effectiveness of the cap-and-trade system in achieving its central purpose: reducing overall GHG emissions. In particular, lenient rules and protocols could conceivably lead US emissions to exceed legislative targets by as much as 500 million tonnes CO₂e in 2020.     

Planning adaptation based on local actors’ knowledge and participation: a climate governance experiment

Involving a wide-range of stakeholders at different moments in the planning of urban adaptation to climate change can help to overcome different barriers to adaptation, such as a lack of common perception, or control over options. This Article argues for an approach that involves a wide range of actors throughout the planning process in order to confront the challenges of urban adaptation to climate change. It builds on the results of a three-year participatory action research project to identify the catalysts with which local administrations can overcome the lack of data, the low level of engagement around the climate issue, and the cause-and-effect linkages of climate change impacts on the urban environment. Significant factors include territorial rootedness, leveraging actors’ experience, interaction between actors, as well as the valuing of local actors as experts of territorial management rather than as novices with regard to climate change adaptation. In addition to contributing towards the engagement of a large number of stakeholders around adaptation issues, a planning process that involves representatives from various sectors and during several stages contributes to a greater understanding of these issues and their linkages. It follows that such a process will bring changes to urban practices by better articulating local concerns about climatic issues.

Policy relevance

Although participation is commonly advocated in policy responses to climate change, only few empirical studies have investigated the ways in which local actors' knowledge can be integrated into climate change adaptation planning processes. The article builds on the results of an action research project carried out in Québec City, Canada, to address the relevance of involving a progressively broader range of actors as the adaptation process moves through its various phases. Given that a multitude of barriers to adaptation are at play at different times in a municipality, collaborations between local stakeholders emerge as a key factor. These collaborations provide greater insight into the linkages between climate change impacts and the urban environment and, in doing so, bring into question ordinary urban management and design practices.     

Unravelling the United Kingdom’s climate policy consensus: The power of ideas,discourse and institutions

As climate change policies and governance initiatives struggle to produce the transformational social changes required, the search for stand out case studies continues. Many have pointed to the period between 2005 and 2008 in the United Kingdom as a promising example of national level innovation. With strong cross-party consensus and a first-of-its-kind legislation the UK established itself as a climate policy leader. However, early warning signs suggest that this institutionalised position is far from secure. Through a novel application of discursive institutionalism this article presents a detailed analysis of the role of ideas in unravelling this ambition under the Conservative-Liberal coalition administration (2010–2015). Discursive interactions among policymakers and other political actors were dominated by ideas about governmental responsibility and economic austerity, establishing an atmosphere of climate policy scepticism and restraint. By situating this conspicuous and influential process of bricolage within its institutional context the importance of how policymakers think and communicate about climate change is made apparent. The power of ideas to influence policy is further demonstrated through their cognitive and normative persuasiveness, by imposing over and excluding alternatives and in their institutional positioning. It can be concluded that despite innovative legislation, institution building and strategic coordination of different types of governance actors the ideational foundations of ambitious climate change politics in the UK have been undermined.     

Tinker,tailor or transform: Gender equality amidst social-ecological change

Global visions of environmental change consider gender equality to be a foundation of sustainable social-ecological systems. Similarly, social-ecological systems frameworks position gender equality as both a precursor to, and a product of, system sustainability. Yet, the degree to which gender equality is being advanced through social-ecological systems change is uncertain. We use the case of small-scale fisheries in the Pacific Islands region to explore the proposition that different social-ecological narratives: (1) ecological, (2) social-ecological, and (3) social, shape the gender equality priorities, intentions and impacts of implementing organizations. We conducted interviews with regional and national fisheries experts (n = 71) and analyzed gender commitments made within policies (n = 29) that influence small-scale fisheries. To explore these data, we developed a ‘Tinker-Tailor-Transform’ gender assessment typology. We find that implementing organizations aligned with the social-ecological and social narratives considered social (i.e., human-centric) goals to be equally or more important than ecological (i.e., eco-centric) goals. Yet in action, gender equality was pursued instrumentally to achieve ecological goals and/or shallow project performance targets. These results highlight that although commitments to gender equality were common, when operationalized commitments become diluted and reoriented. Across all three narratives, organizations mostly ‘Tinkered’ with gender equality in impact, for example, including more women in spaces that otherwise tended to be dominated by men. Impacts predominately focused on the individual (i.e., changing women) rather than driving communal-to-societal level change. We discuss three interrelated opportunities for organizations in applying the ‘Tinker-Tailor-Transform’ assessment typology, including its utility to assist organizations to orient toward intrinsic goals; challenge or reconfigure system attributes that perpetuate gender inequalities; and consciously interrogate discursive positions and beliefs to unsettle habituated policies, initiatives and theories of change.     

Effects of Land Use on the Climate of the United States

Land use practices have replaced much of the natural needleleaf evergreen, broadleaf deciduous, and mixed forests of the Eastern United States with crops. To a lesser extent, the natural grasslands in the Central United States have also been replaced with crops. Simulations with a land surface process model coupled to an atmospheric general circulation model show that the climate of the United States with modern vegetation is significantly different from that with natural vegetation. Three important climate signals caused by modern vegetation are: (1) 1 °C cooling over the Eastern United States and 1 °C warming over the Western United States in spring; (2) summer cooling of up to 2 °C over a wide region of the Central United States; and (3) moistening of the near-surface atmosphere by 0.5 to 1.5 g kg^-1over much of the United States in spring and summer. Although individual months show large, statistically significant differences in precipitation due to land-use practices, these differences average out over the course of the 3-month seasons. These changes in surface temperature and moisture extend well into the atmosphere, up to 500 mb, and affect the boundary layer and atmospheric circulation. The altered climate is due to reduced surface roughness, reduced leaf and stem area index, reduced stomatal resistance, and increased surface albedo with modern vegetation compared to natural vegetation. The climate change caused by land use practices is comparable to other well known anthropogenic climate forcings. For example, it would take 100 to 175 years at the current, observed rate of summer warming over the United States to offset the cooling from deforestation. The summer sulfate aerosol forcing completely offsets the greenhouse forcing over the Eastern United States. Similarly, the climatic effect of North American deforestation, with extensive summer cooling, further offsets the greenhouse forcing.     

It's political: How the salience of one's political identity changes climate change beliefs and policy support

Previous research has demonstrated a striking difference in climate change beliefs and policy support between people who identify with the right-wing of politics and with the left-wing of politics. But are we destined to continue with this divergence? We suggest that there is movement around these differences based on the politicization of climate change and we conducted two experimental studies with 126 and 646 people, respectively, to examine this effect. We found that those people whose political identity was made salient were less likely to believe in an anthropogenic cause of climate change and less likely to support government climate change policies than those whose identity was not made salient; particularly when those people were aligned with the right-wing of politics. The results demonstrate the importance of the salience of one's political identity in determining attitudes and beliefs even for scientific facts such as climate change. Our research also identifies some ways forward in dealing with climate change-based on depoliticizing the issue.     

Voices of young biosphere stewards on the strengths,weaknesses, and ways forward for 74 UNESCO Biosphere Reserves across 83 countries

Young stakeholders are key actors in social-ecological systems, who have the capacity to be agents of sustainability transformation but are also at high risk of exclusion in the unfolding of global change challenges. Despite the focus of sustainability on future generations, there has been little research effort aimed at understanding young actors’ roles as biosphere stewards. In this work we investigate how young stakeholders perceive and participate in the implementation of sustainability objectives in 74 Biosphere Reserves of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO) the Man and the Biosphere (MAB) Programme across 83 countries, through participatory group workshops, individual surveys and grey literature review. We explore to what extent youth perceptions are aligned or not with current understandings of Biosphere Reserves and how young stakeholders are acting in pursuit of Biosphere Reserve objectives. We find that young stakeholders have a comprehensive understanding of the opportunities and challenges faced by environmental governance, such as resilience and adaptation to global change and the governance challenges of implementing adaptive co-management and increasing stakeholder participation. We also show that young stakeholders can be active participants in a wide range of activities that contribute to achieving conservation and development goals in their territories. They are particularly concerned with youth participation within all levels of Biosphere Reserve functioning and with the creation of sustainable livelihood opportunities that will allow future generations to remain in their native territories. Our study provides evidence of the importance of young stakeholder knowledge and perspectives as central actors in conservation and development initiatives, like Biosphere Reserves, and of the need to increase young stakeholder integration and participation within environmental governance.     

National GHG emissions reduction pledges and 2°C: comparison of studies

This article provides further detail on expected global GHG emission levels in 2020, based on the Emissions Gap Report (United Nations Environment Programme, December 2010), assuming the emission reduction proposals in the Copenhagen Accord and Cancun Agreements are met. Large differences are found in the results of individual groups owing to uncertainties in current and projected emission estimates and in the interpretation of the reduction proposals. Regardless of these uncertainties, the pledges for 2020 are expected to deliver emission levels above those that are consistent with a 2°C limit. This emissions gap could be narrowed through implementing the more stringent conditional pledges, minimizing the use of ‘lenient’ credits from forests and surplus emission units, avoiding double-counting of offsets and implementing measures beyond current pledges. Conversely, emission reduction gains from countries moving from their low to high ambition pledges could be more than offset by the use of ‘lenient’ land use, land-use change and forestry (LULUCF) credits and surplus emissions units, if these were used to the maximum. Laying the groundwork for faster emission reduction rates after 2020 appears to be crucial in any case.     

Experiment-based policy change over time: Learning from experiences in the Dutch fen landscape

This study provides insight into the potential of experiment-based policy making to address complex environmental challenges. The investigation shows the usefulness of making an analytical distinction between incremental and synoptic policy experiments to understand successful change over time. Incremental refers here to gradual adjustment of policies in a specific context, synoptic to radical change of policies on a large scale. Success is understood in terms of drawing lessons and realising policy goals, enabling diffusion and improving environmental status. This unique study, including both the initial investigation and a follow-up 10 years after, analyses the dynamics that emerged from seven empirical cases to identify factors affecting the design and success of these two types of experiments. We studied three incremental experiments and four synoptic experiments in the Dutch fen landscape to learn from their practical experiences. This densely populated and commercially used landscape is vulnerable to environmental pressure such as precipitation peaks, sea level rise and droughts. Initiators of the incremental experiments were able to change land-use management practices, albeit staying relatively close to the status quo. In contrast, while initiators of the synoptic experiments expressed higher ambitions in terms of change, these experiments tended to experience stagnation and difficulties in implementation and diffusion. Observations reveal that experiment-based policy change may crucially depend on capacity to deal with stakeholder dynamics and to embed experiments within multi-level institutional settings.     

Climate change influences on pollinator,forest, and farm interactions across a climate gradient

Improved cookstoves have been identified in Mexico as a key opportunity to advance sustainable local development priorities in disadvantaged regions while mitigating climate change. This paper reviews the Patsari Cookstove Project initiated in 2003 by an NGO, Interdisciplinary Group on Appropriate Rural Technology (GIRA). The project applied an interdisciplinary and participative user-centered approach to disseminate improved cookstoves in rural Mexico, with a special focus on indigenous and poor rural communities. To date, GIRA and the Patsari Network have disseminated thousands of stoves using a “training to trainers” model. Benefits from the project include tangible improvements in users’ health, as well as savings in time and money expended on fuelwood procurement and use. The project has also documented substantive environmental benefits from significant mitigation of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions associated with traditional open fires. To sustain scaling up efforts over the long-term, two networks have been created: The Patsari Network, which includes several organizations promoting Patsari stoves for household users, and the Tsiri Network, which supports local food security and the empowerment of indigenous women through the promotion of institutional cookstoves. Through appropriately designed and implemented local interventions, the project demonstrates that the goals of advancing sustainable local development in rural areas and climate change mitigation may not be contradictory, and may in fact reinforce one another.     

Impacts of Land-Use Data on the Simulation of Surface Air Temperature in Northwest China

This study examines the impacts of land-use data on the simulation of surface air temperature in Northwest China by the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model. International Geosphere–Biosphere Program (IGBP) landuse data with 500-m spatial resolution are generated from Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) satellite products. These data are used to replace the default U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) land-use data in the WRF model. Based on the data recorded by national basic meteorological observing stations in Northwest China, results are compared and evaluated. It is found that replacing the default USGS land-use data in the WRF model with the IGBP data improves the ability of the model to simulate surface air temperature in Northwest China in July and December 2015. Errors in the simulated daytime surface air temperature are reduced, while the results vary between seasons. There is some variation in the degree and range of impacts of land-use data on surface air temperature among seasons. Using the IGBP data, the simulated daytime surface air temperature in July 2015 improves at a relatively small number of stations, but to a relatively large degree; whereas the simulation of daytime surface air temperature in December 2015 improves at almost all stations, but only to a relatively small degree (within 1°C). Mitigation of daytime surface air temperature overestimation in July 2015 is influenced mainly by the change in ground heat flux. The modification of underestimated temperature comes mainly from the improvement of simulated net radiation in December 2015.     

Racing climate change: Collaboration and conflict in California's global climate change policy arena

Media accounts routinely refer to California's Assembly Bill 32 (AB 32), the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, as “landmark” climate change legislation. On its surface, this label is an accurate reflection of the state's forward-thinking stance across many environmental issues including pesticides, toxic substances, solid waste, and air quality. For all its promise, however, AB 32 can also be considered a low point in the landscape of conflict between state environmental regulators and California's environmental justice movement. While the legislation included several provisions to address the procedural and distributive dimensions of environmental justice, the implementation of AB 32 has been marked by heated conflict. The most intense conflicts over AB 32 revolve around the primacy of market mechanisms such as “cap and trade.” This article examines the drivers and the manifestations of these dynamics of collaboration and conflict between environmental justice advocates and state regulators, and pays particular attention to the scalar and racialized quality of the neoliberal discourse. The contentiousness of climate change politics in California offers scholars and practitioners around the world a cautionary tale of how the best intentions for integrating environmental justice principles into climate change policy do not necessarily translate into implementation and how underlying racialized fractures can upend collaboration between state and social movement actors.     

Long-term change in October rainfall patterns in southern Israel

Summary A comprehensive study of long-term changes in October rainfall patterns in southern Israel, a semi-arid fringe zone between the Mediterranean coastal plain and the Negev Desert, was carried out. It was earlier postulated that the observed positive trend in October rainfall amounts may result from land-use changes in the area following the installation of the National Water Carrier (NWC) in the early 1960s. The purpose of the present study is to delineate the anticipated local effects, as well as their spatial extent, in order to investigate the possibility of climatic change over a larger synoptic scale.In the study region, a total number of 51 rainfall stations with long-term records up to 55 years, were analyzed, along with six control stations in other parts of the country. All stations were analyzed for trends in early seasonal rainfall, spatial variability during the two reference periods before and after the 60s, and for the ratio between rain per day (RPD) and number of rain days (NRD) during the two periods.The results of the analyses point to a well defined localized climatic change in October rainfall patterns within the study area, that is traceable to intensive and extensive land-use changes following the installation of the NWC.With 5 Figures     

The role of culture and traditional knowledge in climate change adaptation: Insights from East Kimberley,Australia

Indigenous peoples offer alternative knowledge about climate variability and change based on their own locally developed knowledges and practices of resource use. In this article we discuss the role of traditional ecological knowledge in monitoring and adapting to changing environmental conditions. Our case study documents a project to record the seasonal knowledge of the Miriwoong people in northern Australia. The study demonstrates how indigenous groups’ accumulate detailed baseline information about their environment to guide their resource use and management, and develop worldviews and cultural values associated with this knowledge. We highlight how traditional ecological knowledge plays a critical role in mediating indigenous individuals and communities’ understandings of environmental changes in the East Kimberley region of north-west Australia, and how these beliefs may influence future decision-making about how to go about adapting to climate change at a local level.     

Linkages between climate change and sustainable development

Climate change does not yet feature prominently within the environmental or economic policy agendas of developing countries. Yet evidence shows that some of the most adverse effects of climate change will be in developing countries, where populations are most vulnerable and least likely to easily adapt to climate change, and that climate change will affect the potential for development in these countries. Some synergies already exist between climate change policies and the sustainable development agenda in developing countries, such as energy efficiency, renewable energy, transport and sustainable land-use policies. Despite limited attention from policy-makers to date, climate change policies could have significant ancillary benefits for the local environment. The reverse is also true as local and national policies to address congestion, air quality, access to energy services and energy diversity may also limit GHG emissions. Nevertheless there could be significant trade-offs associated with deeper levels of mitigation in some countries, for example where developing countries are dependent on indigenous coal and may be required to switch to cleaner yet more expensive fuels to limit emissions. The distributional impacts of such policies are an important determinant of their feasibility and need to be considered up-front. It follows that future agreements on mitigation and adaptation under the convention will need to recognise the diverse situations of developing countries with respect to their level of economic development, their vulnerability to climate change and their ability to adapt or mitigate. Recognition of how climate change is likely to influence other development priorities may be a first step toward building cost-effective strategies and integrated, institutional capacity in developing countries to respond to climate change. Opportunities may also exist in developing countries to use regional economic organisations to assist in the design of integrated responses and to exploit synergies between climate change and other policies such as those designed to combat desertification and preserve biodiversity.     

Economic and ecosystem costs and benefits of alternative land use and management scenarios in the Lake Rotorua,New Zealand,catchment

A significant challenge in resource management is addressed: the perceived trade-off between economic growth and ecosystem restoration and conservation. Traditional approaches to management regard restoration as a potential cost to economic productivity. In this study we show that by considering a broader range of economic values, including ecosystem services values, an argument can be made that restoration of lake ecosystems also leads to favourable economic outcomes when commonly disregarded values are considered. Our case study analyses the ecological outcomes of different catchment mitigation and land use scenarios in terms of water quality results in a lake, assessing changes in land use values based on opportunity costs, and ecosystem services values. We show that when considering the value of ecosystem services, intensive agricultural land use is not necessarily the most economically valuable form of land use within a lake catchment. Indeed, a shift towards alternative land uses within a catchment can lead to both ongoing economic benefits and improvements in water quality. In this context, land-use change offers an option for water quality improvement that minimises lake and land mitigation costs, while adding value to catchment land use. An argument is made supporting land use change towards indigenous forest types, which can sustain alternative sources of income such as a range of recreational values, while supporting important ecosystem functions for the region.     

Water Quality Co-Effects of Greenhouse Gas Mitigation in U.S. Agriculture

This study develops first-order estimates of water quality co-effects of terrestrial greenhouse gas (GHG) emission offset strategies in U.S. agriculture by linking a national level agricultural sector model (ASMGHG) to a national level water quality model (NWPCAM). The simulated policy scenario considers GHG mitigation incentive payments of $25 and $50 per tonne, carbon equivalent to landowners for reducing emissions or enhancing the sequestration of GHG through agricultural and land-use practices. ASMGHG projects that these GHG price incentives could induce widespread conversion of agricultural to forested lands, along with alteration of tillage practices, crop mix on land remaining in agriculture, and livestock management. This study focuses on changes in cropland use and management. The results indicate that through agricultural cropland about 60 to 70 million tonnes of carbon equivalent (MMTCE) emissions can be mitigated annually in the U.S. These responses also lead to a 2% increase in aggregate national water quality, with substantial variation across regions. Such GHG mitigation activities are found to reduce annual nitrogen loadings into the Gulf of Mexico by up to one half of the reduction goals established by the national Watershed Nutrient Task Force for addressing the hypoxia problem.     

On the importance of baseline setting in carbon offsets markets

Incorporating carbon offsets in the design of cap-and-trade programs remains a controversial issue because of its potential unintended impacts on emissions. At the heart of this discussion is the issue of crediting of emissions reductions. Projects can be correctly, over- or under-credited for their actual emissions reductions. We develop a unified framework that considers the supply of offsets within a cap-and-trade program that allows us to compare the relative impact of over-credited offsets and under-credited emissions reductions on overall emissions under different levels of baseline stringency and carbon prices. In the context of a national carbon pricing scheme that includes offsets, we find that the emissions impacts of over-credited offsets can be fully balanced out by under-credited emissions reductions without sacrificing a significant portion of the overall supply of offsets, provided emissions baselines are stringent enough. In the presence of high predicted business-as-usual (BAU) emissions uncertainty or low carbon prices, to maintain the environmental integrity of the program, baselines need to be set at stringent levels, in some cases below 50 percent of predicted BAU emissions. As predicted BAU emissions uncertainty declines or as the carbon market achieves higher equilibrium prices, however, less stringent baselines can balance out the emissions impacts of over-credited offsets and under-credited emissions reductions. These results imply that to maintain environmental integrity of offsets programs, baseline stringency should be tailored to project characteristics and market conditions that influence the proportion of over-credited offsets to under-credited emissions reductions.     

Mapping global patterns of land use decision-making

Humans have changed most of the terrestrial surface by changing land-use and land-cover. The spatial distribution and extent of land-cover changes have been studied and mapped widely, using remote sensing and geospatial technologies. Although there are numerous studies on the human decisions underlying such changes, they are limited to local case-studies. How such local-scale patterns of decision-making can be used to explain land-use change globally is unknown. Using a collection of local studies from a literature review, we studied the contextual conditions of different modes of land-use change decision-making and present global maps of the potential distribution of decision-making in land-use change. We find that decision-making in land-use can be explained, to a large extent, by the socio-economic, climatic and soil conditions of a location, captured by global data proxies of these conditions. Survival and livelihood objectives are positively associated to the spatial variation in childhood malnutrition and distance to roads, and negatively to total economic output of an area. Economic objectives on the other hand, are positively associated to total economic output, but also to the annual precipitation at the location. Similar trends are observed when looking at more detailed decision-making types: survivalist, subsistence-oriented and market-oriented smallholder decision-making types are more likely found in areas with higher poverty levels and overall lower levels of socio-economic development. The spatial distribution can be used to understand the occurrence of land-use intensification trajectories and to account for variation in decision-making in global land-use models. Finally, we provide a representation of the spread of case-studies and which contexts are poorly represented by case-studies.