Workshop on Institutions for Ecosystem Services
The program on Collective Action and Property Rights (CAPRi), part of the CGIAR program on Policies, Institutions and Markets (PIM), the CGIAR program on Water, Land, and Ecosystems (WLE), and the CGIAR program on Forests, Trees, and Agroforestry (FTA) are accepting abstracts on the topic of “Institutions for Ecosystems Services” that will be presented at an international research workshop October 27-29th 2014 at the International Food Policy Research Institute’s Headquarters in Washington, D.C. Abstracts must be received no later than August 6, 2014. Rationale Humans depend on the functioning of natural and constructed ecosystems to provide many of the basic elements necessary for survival and sustenance. Agriculture depends on ecosystems, yet the practice of agriculture alters and affect ecosystem and their capacity to provide services. Certain agricultural activities may have specific environmental effects, bringing about (positive or negative, intended or unintended) consequences. An ecosystem services perspective strives to identify, understand, and properly value the full range of benefits humans derive from ecosystems and include the production and flow of these services in agricultural management practices at the field and landscape scale. Ecosystem services are proving to be fertile ground for both research and policy. Researchers have categorized and delineated the various kinds of ecosystems services, studied their interactions, and developed techniques for assessing their stock, modeling their flows, and assigning monetary values to some. Policymakers have used the concept of ecosystem services to account for the consequences likely to result from development interventions or policy initiatives. An ecosystem services perspective helps to internalize externalities, making visible and salient potential costs and benefits and distributional/social equity issues that might otherwise have been invisible, ignored, or excluded from economic evaluation. Examples of the policy applications of ecosystem services include most obviously the numerous payment for ecosystem services (PES) schemes in practice today, but also the many cost-benefit analyses that have been improved by a greater appreciation for the value (cost) of preserving (destroying) a given ecosystem. Understanding the full suite of ecosystem services in a given context, instead of focusing on a single resource at a time, has undoubtedly deepened and broadened our understanding of the complex ways livelihoods interact with stocks of natural and human capital. This perspective, however, raises important new questions for resource management. As Ostrom (2009) argued, a challenge to understanding and managing natural resources sustainably is the diversity of concepts and languages used by the various scientific disciplines to describe these “social-ecological systems” (SESs). This calls for research that spans disciplines, bringing together biophysical and social scientists, and appropriate tools and methods that can be used in such research. Of particular relevance to the question of how to manage ecosystem services is the issue of institutions, which encompass a variety of arrangements that influence smallholder decisions about the use of their land and resources. These include formal state institutions and markets, but also encompass local-level, customary, collective action, and informal institutions that regulate the use, access to, and distribution of benefits from the natural resources and ecosystems. Ecosystem services may introduce additional institutional requirements. They might, for example, require that careful attention be paid to issues of property rights and secure tenure, requiring local actors to interface with environmental service markets at new scales, or encouraging the formation of new collective action institutions to manage ecosystem service producing resources, enforce rules, and distribute benefits. In addition, new institutional challenges are created by efforts to scale-up existing programs to cover larger landscapes. Past CAPRi work has identified the importance of property rights and collective action institutions for smallholders to benefit from environmental service schemes focusing on carbon, water, and biodiversity (Swallow et al. 2005). This research workshop will accept abstracts that focus on identifying the institutions that are necessary for recognizing, supporting, and scaling ecosystem services in agricultural landscapes and the interventions that can strengthen these institutions. As a goal, this research workshop will: · Encourage sharing and discussion on research methods and tools to study the links between institutions and ecosystem services · Synthesize lessons about institutional arrangements needed to ensure that ecosystem services projects are able to deliver benefits to local resource users and produce local, regional, and national global environmental benefits · Identify policies and program interventions that can strengthen these institutions · Outline priorities for future research, policy, and project implementation, particularly of relevance for PIM, WLE, andFTA programs Outputs will include a series of case studies (with documented research methods), a synthesis paper, and identification of priorities for PIM, WLE, and FTA research. Abstract submission Abstracts of proposed papers must be received by August 6, 2014. The abstract (250 to 400 words) should specify the focus of analysis, the empirical evidence to be presented, methodological approach, key conclusions, and implications for development policy, strategy, or institutional change processes. Abstracts will be selected based on the following criteria: - Research focus. Clearly addresses the topic outlined above, persuasively stated. Please note that abstracts that measure or address ecosystem services alone, but do not address the institutional implications, will not be selected. - Lessons. Promising lessons for development policy, strategy, or institutional change. - Empirical evidence. Strong basis of experience or data to underpin the analysis. - Methodological innovation. Results from qualitative, quantitative methods and trans-disciplinary research approaches are encouraged, with preference for innovative methods that can be replicated or adapted and developed to cover different conditions. - Diversity of regions and resource systems. - Clarity. The abstract should effectively present the main elements of the paper as a concise, coherent statement. Abstracts must be received no later than August 6, 2014. Full papers selected for inclusion in the workshop (6000 to 8000 words) must be submitted by September 31, 2014. Please send abstracts to Quinn Bernier at q<mailto:[email protected]>[email protected]. Please also contact Quinn with any questions regarding the workshop. Limited funds may also be available to fund the travel of selected presenters. Funding questions will be resolved on an individual basis. The call is open to researchers and partners participating in PIM, WLE, and FTA projects and research. Reference: Swallow, B., R. S. Meinzen-Dick, and M.V. Noordwijk. 2005. Localizing demand and supply of environmental services: Interaction with property rights, collective action, and the welfare of the poor. CAPRi Working Paper 42. Washington DC: IFPRI. http://www.capri.cgiar.org/pdf/capriwp42.pdf.
