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Estimation of Ecosystem Services: A Case Study of a Community along the Mekong River

Estimation of Ecosystem Services: A Case Study of a Community along the Mekong River. Apisom Intralawan Mae Fah Luang University, Chiang Rai, Thailand. Outline. Background and Rationale Research Methodology Findings Conclusions. Where is Mekong River Basin?. Physical Characterisitics.

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Estimation of Ecosystem Services: A Case Study of a Community along the Mekong River

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  1. Estimation of Ecosystem Services: A Case Study of a Community along the Mekong River Apisom Intralawan Mae Fah Luang University, Chiang Rai, Thailand

  2. Outline • Background and Rationale • Research Methodology • Findings • Conclusions

  3. Where is Mekong River Basin?

  4. Physical Characterisitics • Shared by 6 countries. (China, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam) • Tremendous hydropower potential. • Tropical, monsoon, great biodiversity. • Flood pulse—avg. wet season discharge can be up to fifty times greater than dry season (Jacob 1999).

  5. Socio-economic Characteristics • Approximately 70 million (2-2.5% population growth rate— projected to 100-140 million in 2050) • Resource rich, but economically poor—46.7% (China), 32.5% (Thailand), 73.2% (Laos), 77.7%(Cambodia), 63.7% (Vietnam) live on less than US$ 2 a day. (UNDP 2005) • Fisher-farmers, subsistence life style.

  6. Where is Pak Ing Tai community? • 1.2 sq.km. degraded forest-swamp areas, plantations, and residential area. • 142 villagers, 40 households, rural farmer-fishers, subsistence life style. • Migrated from Laos and settled down during Indo-China colonization in the early 1900’s. • Multiple livelihood strategies necessary in a context of seasonal climate variations and changing dependence upon hydrological systems and the local landscape.

  7. Development Programs • In the past 30 years, Thai government has adopted market liberalization and followed modernization development strategy. • More recently, at the Asian Development Bank’s suggestion, the Thai government has shown renewed interest in development, and has identified nine elements for the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) cooperation: transportation, energy, telecommunications, the environment, human resource development, tourism, trade, investment and agriculture (Thailand 2005)

  8. Concerns • The proposed development schemes will greatly affect land use land cover (LULC) in the area. • Transparency, equity, sustainability issues. • Lack of participation. Research Questions What have been the consequences and tradeoffs of these changes?

  9. Research Methodology • Remote sensing (How the land has changed overtime?) • Ecosystem Service Valuation (What are the tradeoff?) • Ecosystem services are the benefits that nature provides to households, communities and economies (Costanza et al. 1997; Boyd and Banzhaf 2007) • The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (2003) classifies ecosystem services in to four functional grouping: 1) provisioning services, 2) regulating services, 3) cultural services, and 4) supporting services.

  10. Research Methodology • Value transfer applies economic value estimates from one location (a reference study site) to a similar site (a policy site) in another location. • Xie et al. (2003) extrapolated the equivalent weight factors of ecosystem services per hectare based on the Chinese context. • Since Thailand and China share similar economic situations, popular culture and attitudes toward environmental conservation, value transfer using coefficiencies based on the Chinese situation used is appropriate

  11. Research Methodology Estimation of Ecosystem Service TESV = ∑ (Ai x VCi), where TESV = Total Value of Ecosystem Services for each biome Ai = area of each land category in hectare VCi = value efficiencyin dollar per hectare per year

  12. Findings (Land Use Changes)

  13. Findings Land Classification Statistics

  14. Findings

  15. Findings (Value Transfer Coefficient)

  16. Findings

  17. Ecosystem Services per biome per year

  18. Findings: • The total ESV was $USD 102.48, $80.86, $80.88, and $71.07 million per year. • ESV from cropland has increased from $USD 11.2 million in 1977 to $USD 15.1 million per year in 2008. • The overall estimated changes in ESV shows a decline of $USD 31.41 million during the period of 1977 to 2008.

  19. Conclusions • Had ecosystems been treated “the commons” and their benefits were paid by users, revenues generated from payment of ecosystem services could be used to either support related public services or eradicate poverty. • appropriate arrangement for payment for ecosystem service mechanism is needed.

  20. Questions, Comments, Suggestions

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