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Does it work to pay people not to cut the forest?

freethink.com · 2,938 words · saved by 1 readers

Natural ecosystems do us countless favors, from purifying the water and air to harboring and nurturing the pollinators we need to grow much of our food. Yet landowners may have other, more directly profitable uses in mind for their land, be it growing crops, ranching cattle or building a factory, apartment building or office complex. It might seem only fair, then, that if we want people to leave their wildland intact for the greater good, we should pitch in to alleviate the opportunity cost: the money a person might have made from developing the land instead. But how do we organize this in a fair and effective way? Economist Sven Wunder, principal scientist at the European Forest Institute and senior associate at the Center for International Forestry Research, has spent years investigating just this. Wunder, who shared his insights in two 2020 articles in the Annual Review of Resource Economics, told Knowable Magazine that evidence for the effectiveness of such projects is often sorely

By Tim Vernimmen | Knowable Magazine January 12, 2024 Fields Climate Crisis Economics Ecosystems Share Copy a link to the article entitled Does it work to pay people not to cut the forest? Share Does it work to pay people not to cut the forest? on Twitter (X) Share Does it work to pay people not to cut the forest? on Facebook Subscribe to Freethink on Substack for free Get our favorite new stories right to your inbox every week Subscribe now Natural ecosystems do us countless favors, from purifying the water and air to harboring and nurturing the pollinators we need to grow much of our food. Y

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