Comparing Ecosystem Service preferences between urban and rural dwellers

Urbanization can profoundly alter socioecological relationships, but its influence on how people perceive and value ecosystem services (ES) is poorly understood. We reviewed an emerging literature in which sociocultural valuation of ES is compared among urban and rural dwellers. This research suggests that, although regulating and cultural ES were highly valued by both rural and urban dwellers, urban dwellers tended to value provisioning ES less than rural dwellers did. Differences in ES valuation could result from different experiences, uses, and needs for ES of urban and rural dwellers. We also identified two key gaps in the literature that relate to understanding how diverse ES contribute differently to the well-being of rural and urban populations (and the relevance of these differences for environmental education and policy) and the changing roles of ES in developing countries and vulnerable ecosystems, such as small islands, that face pressing environmental, social, and economic challenges

Environmental justice in coastal systems: perspectives from communities confronting change

Life in the Pacific is characterised by interconnected, fast and slow socio-ecological change. These changes inevitably involve navigating questions of justice, as they shift who benefits from, owns, and governs resources, and whose claims and rights are recognized. Thus, greater understanding of perceptions of environmental justice within communities will be crucial to support fair adaptation. We contend that an environmental justice approach offers a theoretical foundation to help illuminate key concerns and trade-offs as communities navigate global change. Here, we apply an empirical environmental justice lens to the use and customary management of coastal resources in Papua New Guinea. Through two case studies, we examine perceptions of distributional, procedural and recognitional justice. We find similarities and differences. There were common concerns about the injustice of unequal fishing pressure and destructive methods, but in one case, concerns about people’s material needs overrode concerns about non-compliance and unequal costs. In the other case, deliberative decision-making served as a platform for not only negotiating and re-defining the distribution of costs and benefits, but also airing grievances, thereby strengthening recognition of different people’s values and concerns. In addition, we find that as coastal developing communities face increasing social and environmental changes, the procedures for governing resources and thus the means to make fair decisions about distribution, is inextricably connected to recognitional aspects of justice, such as respect, that can confer or undermine legitimacy. The heterogeneity of justice criteria in our cases emphasizes the need to elicit and understand plural justice perceptions in different contexts

Urbanization affects how people perceive and benefit from ecosystem service bundles in coastal communities of the Global South

Urbanization profoundly transforms ecosystems and the bundles of services they provide to people. The relationship between urbanization and how ecosystem services are produced together to form bundles has received increased research interest. However, there is limited understanding of how people’s perceptions of the benefits they receive from ecosystem service bundles change with urbanization, particularly in the Global South. Addressing this research gap is critical given perceptions influence how people relate to, use and manage their environment. We used a paired sampling design to contrast urban and rural dwellers’ perceptions of ecosystem service bundles associated with local ecosystems in the Solomon Islands, a rapidly urbanizing Small Island Developing State. Interviews from 200 households revealed that urbanization simplified the composition of perceived ecosystem service bundles. Contributions of provisioning and some cultural ecosystem services were reduced in bundles in urban areas, indicating a decrease in the diversity of experiences of nature and ecosystems providing those experiences. Examining changes in perceived ecosystem service bundles offers a valuable perspective on the implications of social-ecological change for ecosystem service demand and human wellbeing. Our approach presents a novel and simple way to identify and analyse bundles, providing insights into how and where people benefit from nature

Advancing procedural justice in conservation

Just participation in conservation decision-making is a moral imperative and critical to achieving social and ecological goals. However, understanding of what constitutes a just decision-making process in conservation remains limited. Integrating key literature from environmental justice, psychology of justice, and participatory conservation, we identify 11 procedural justice criteria, many of which have been overlooked in conservation literature. We develop a framework to help promote procedural justice in conservation decision-making which organizes the criteria into three key domains (Process properties, Agency of participants, Interpersonal treatment), which are underpinned by the justice dimension of recognition. We highlight seven policy levers that can be used to enhance procedural justice (e.g., scalar and contextual fit, conflict resolution, facilitation). However, advancing just decision-making using this framework requires addressing a number of key challenges, in particular those related to broader structural power inequalities, and elucidating and accounting for plural and situated conceptions of procedural justice. We outline a number of pathways to overcome these challenges, including promoting knowledge coproduction and self-reflexivity

The influence of landscape context on the production of cultural ecosystem services

Recent efforts to apply sustainability concepts to entire landscapes have seen increasing interest in approaches that connect socioeconomic and biophysical systems. Evaluating these connections through a cultural ecosystem services lens clarifies how different spatiotemporal scales and levels of organisation influence the production of cultural benefits. Currently, however, the effects of multi-level and multi-scale ecological variation on the production of cultural benefits have not yet been disentangled. Objectives To quantify the amount of variation in cultural ecosystem service provision by birds to birders that is due to landscape-level attributes. Methods We used data from 293 birding routes and 101 different birders in South African National Parks to explore the general relationships between birder responses to bird species and environmental conditions, bird-related observations, the biophysical attributes of the landscape and their effect on bird-related cultural benefits. Results Biophysical attributes (particularly biome, vegetation type, and variance in elevation) significantly increased the percentage of variance explained in birder benefits from 57 to 65%, demonstrating that birder benefits are derived from multi-level (birds to ecosystems) and multi-scale (site to landscape) social and ecological interactions. Conclusions Landscape attributes influence people's perceptions of cultural ecosystem service provision by individual species. Recognition of the complex, localised and inextricable linkage of cultural ecosystem services to biophysical attributes can improve our understanding of the landscape characteristics that affect the supply and demand of cultural ecosystem services

Perceptions of cyclone preparedness: assessing the role of individual adaptive capacity and social capital in the Wet Tropics, Australia

Given projections of future climate-related disasters, understanding the conditions that facilitate disaster preparedness is critical to achieving sustainable development. Here, we studied communities within the Wet Tropics bioregion, Australia to explore whether people’s perceived preparedness for a future cyclone relates to their: (1) perceived individual adaptive capacity (in terms of flexibility and capacity to plan and learn); and (2) structural and cognitive social capital. We found that people's perceived cyclone preparedness was only related to their perceived individual flexibility in the face of change. Given that people's perceived cyclone preparedness was related to individualistic factors, it is plausible that individualism-collectivism orientations influence people's perceptions at an individual level. These results suggest that in the Wet Tropics region, enhancing people’s psychological flexibility may be an important step when preparing for future cyclones. Our study highlights the need to tailor disaster preparedness initiatives to the region in question, and thus our results may inform disaster risk management and sustainable development policies

Charting the value and limits of other effective conservation measures (OECMs) for marine conservation: A Delphi study

Other effective conservation measures (OECMs) will play an important role in the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework as a way for governments to achieve “30 × 30” (30% protection of land and oceans by 2030). However, the policy tool remains relatively new, is expanding from multiple perspectives, and requires clarification. We conducted a Delphi study – a structured technique designed to elicit the insights of a panel of experts – to chart the value and limits of OECMs for marine conservation. Results of the Delphi reveal a high degree of consensus on several core areas of this emerging policy tool. Experts agreed that OECMs can advance equitable and effective conservation. Realizing these opportunities will require strengthening local and Indigenous rights and prioritizing principles of social equity. The panel also agreed on five key challenges, ranging from ensuring that the burden to prove effectiveness does not fall to local communities to securing adequate resources to support OECMs. In contrast, no consensus was reached on how to measure the effectiveness of OECMs, highlighting the need to develop shared monitoring guidelines. Taken together, these findings outline a clear policy and research agenda to support the contributions of OECMs towards equitable, effective, and enduring conservation

Transdisciplinary partnerships for sustainability: an evaluation guide

Transdisciplinary research, in which academics and actors from outside the academy co-produce knowledge, is an important approach to address urgent sustainability challenges. Indeed, to meet these real-world challenges, governments, universities, development agencies, and civil society organizations have made substantial investments in transdisciplinary partnerships. Yet to date, our understanding of the performance, as well as impacts, of these partnerships for sustainability is limited. Here, we provide a guide to assess the performance and impacts of transdisciplinary partnerships for sustainability. We offer key steps to navigate and examine the partnership process for continuous improvement, and to understand how transdisciplinary partnership is contributing to sustainable futures

Adoption and diffusion of technical capacity-building innovations by small-scale artisanal fishers in Fiji

Adoption of innovations by farmers and fishers can depend on factors specific to both individuals and their social contexts. Research on the adoption and diffusion of innovations promoted through capacity-building training can provide lessons to support the design and implementation of future development programs. We assess the adoption, diffusion, and outcomes of a livelihoods training program focused on improving postharvest handling and processing of sea cucumbers in 29 coastal villages in Fiji. One year after delivery of the training program, we conducted interviews with sea cucumber fishers (n = 278) and commercial processors (n = 12), as well as focus group discussions (n = 27) with women to examine: (1) which modes of training (training video, manual, and workshops) were most useful; (2) individual- and community-scale characteristics related to adoption and knowledge sharing; (3) whether training produced long-term changes in processing methods used by fishers; and (4) perceived barriers to adoption. Among fishers who were exposed to two or more modes of training (n = 97), most (65%) reported the workshop and manual to be equally useful. Knowledge about the improved methods was shared by 71% of trained fishers and occurred more frequently among women (80%) than men (64%). Trained fishers used shorter, less variable first cooking durations than untrained fishers, and differences were significant for two of six sea cucumber species groups. Adoption and knowledge sharing was not significantly related to the multiscale characteristics examined (age, gender, education, resource dependence, village population size, market access). Some fishers could not access salt for processing, and others were constrained by patron-client relationships. Our study shows that technical capacity-building can benefit from complementary training modes, however other constraints on adoption (e.g., access to materials, patron-client relationships) may need to be addressed to achieve the full benefits of training programs

The role of socio-demographic characteristics in mediating relationships between people and nature

Research on ecosystem services has focused on their availability or supply and often takes a socially-aggregated approach that assumes a single human community of identical beneficiaries. However, people's ability to derive benefits from ecosystem services can differ strongly across societal groups. Access to ecosystem services can be related to socio-demographic characteristics such as material wealth, gender, education and age. Developing environmental management that does not have unequal impacts on different groups thus depends on taking a socially-disaggregated approach to assessing perceptions of ecosystem services. We explored how socio-demographic characteristics relate to cultural functional groups based on perceived bird traits. Using perception data on 491 bird species from 401 respondents along urban-rural gradients in South Africa, we found that socio-demographic characteristics are strongly associated with cultural functional groups based on perceived bird traits. Our results provide a starting point for understanding heterogeneity in the benefits from avian ecosystem services and how perceptions of cultural functional groups vary across societal groups