Compensation Schemes

The argument that part of the value of bio-diversity accrues to the global community and people in developed countries, while many of the costs, in particular in foregone production, accrue to livestock producers and others in developing countries, implies a case for beneficiary compensation payments. Such an agenda is now explicitly discussed within and between the developed countries, where subsidies to farming are increasingly linked to farmers' maintenance of landscape amenity. To date this agenda has not been explicitly addressed in terms of transfers from developed to developing countries, but this now needs to be done, especially where population pressure in the vicinity of protected areas (as on the western boundaries of the Serengeti National Park) would make any direct benefits to households from local management of wildlife minimal.

Key References

Mearns R "Livestock and Environment: potential for complementarity" World Animal Review 88, 1997

Mearns R "Balancing Livestock Production and Environmental Goals" World Animal Review 89, 1997.

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