Content area
Full Text
About the Authors:
Laura López-Hoffman
* E-mail: [email protected]
Affiliations School of Natural Resources & the Environment, The University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona, United States of America, Udall Center for Studies in Public Policy, The University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona, United States of America
Ruscena Wiederholt
Affiliations School of Natural Resources & the Environment, The University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona, United States of America, Udall Center for Studies in Public Policy, The University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona, United States of America
Chris Sansone
Affiliation: Bayer CropScience, Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, United States of America
Kenneth J. Bagstad
Affiliation: United States Geological Survey, Geosciences and Environmental Change Science Center, Denver, Colorado, United States of America
Paul Cryan
Affiliation: United States Geological Survey, Fort Collins Science Center, Fort Collins, Colorado, United States of America
Jay E. Diffendorfer
Affiliation: United States Geological Survey, Geosciences and Environmental Change Science Center, Denver, Colorado, United States of America
Joshua Goldstein
Affiliation: Department of Human Dimensions of Natural Resources, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado, United States of America
Kelsie LaSharr
Affiliation: School of Natural Resources & the Environment, The University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona, United States of America
John Loomis
Affiliation: Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado, United States of America
Gary McCracken
Affiliation: Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Tennessee, United States of America
Rodrigo A. Medellín
Affiliation: Instituto de Ecología, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Distrito Federal, México
Amy Russell
Affiliation: Department of Biology, Grand Valley State University, Allendale, Michigan, United States of America
Darius Semmens
Affiliation: United States Geological Survey, Geosciences and Environmental Change Science Center, Denver, Colorado, United States of America
Introduction
The underlying goal of market-based, Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES) approaches to conservation is the creation of monetary incentives for the protection of critical ecological processes such as watershed functioning, pollination and natural pest control [1], [2]. Within the conservation community, criticisms about market-based programs range from the ideological – e.g. unease that the approach diminishes nature's intrinsic value [3] – to apprehensions about the nature of the market [3], [4]. The latter criticism stems from the worry there will be no reason to protect ecosystems when their services are no longer perceived to be...