“Payment for ecosystem services” and “natural capital” have become an increasingly influential approach to natural resource management. Instead of viewing natural resources as extractable raw materials for one-off uses, this approach recognizes a wide array of ecological products and services that nature provides to humans, from provision of food, clean water and air to regulation of climate and carbon storage. Finding a way to mainstream this approach into decision-making is a matter of urgency to reshape the way we value and safeguard ecosystems.
China’s quest to build an “ecological civilization” reflects a broader recognition that only a healthy and vibrant environment can sustain economic prosperity and a thriving society.
This project seeks to identify and design innovative and diversified mechanisms that help derive economic value sustainably from local ecological products and ecosystem services so as to benefit local communities and safeguard the long-term health and integrity of the ecological environment.