IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/agiwat/v145y2014icp39-49.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Financing watershed conservation: Lessons from Ecuador's evolving water trust funds

Author

Listed:
  • Kauffman, Craig M.

Abstract

In early 2000, the city of Quito, Ecuador, established the Water Protection Fund (FONAG) to provide sustainable financing for the management and conservation of surrounding watersheds. FONAG was innovative in that it pioneered the use of trust funds in a voluntary, decentralized mechanism for financing watershed conservation. Since then, at least 15 water trust funds have been created or are under development in the Northern Andes, seven of which are in Ecuador. Ecuador's later water funds share many similarities with FONAG, but there are also important differences. This article analyzes the evolution of Ecuador's water trust funds since the creation of FONAG. It does so by comparing the development and effects-to-date of two of the most-recent Ecuadorian water funds: the Fund for Páramo Management and Fight Against Poverty in Tungurahua and the Regional Water Fund (FORAGUA). The article compares these newer water trust funds with FONAG and early payment for environmental services programs to identify four lessons regarding the financing of watershed conservation and related changes in community-level watershed management within Ecuador. The evolution of Ecuador's water trust funds highlights their ability to adapt to different socio-cultural and political conditions, including those that oppose the commodification of natural resources. As such, water funds provide an innovative model for providing sustainable financing for watershed conservation in countries like Ecuador where privatization is not possible for either legal or cultural reasons.

Suggested Citation

  • Kauffman, Craig M., 2014. "Financing watershed conservation: Lessons from Ecuador's evolving water trust funds," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 145(C), pages 39-49.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:agiwat:v:145:y:2014:i:c:p:39-49
    DOI: 10.1016/j.agwat.2013.09.013
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0378377413002540
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.agwat.2013.09.013?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Matzek, Virginia & Wilson, Kerrie A. & Kragt, Marit, 2019. "Mainstreaming of ecosystem services as a rationale for ecological restoration in Australia," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 35(C), pages 79-86.
    2. Liu, Moucheng & Yang, Lun & Min, Qingwen & Bai, Yangying, 2018. "Eco-compensation standards for agricultural water conservation: A case study of the paddy land-to-dry land program in China," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 204(C), pages 192-197.
    3. Bremer, Leah L. & Auerbach, Dan A. & Goldstein, Joshua H. & Vogl, Adrian L. & Shemie, Daniel & Kroeger, Timm & Nelson, Joanna L. & Benítez, Silvia P. & Calvache, Alejandro & Guimarães, João & Herron, , 2016. "One size does not fit all: Natural infrastructure investments within the Latin American Water Funds Partnership," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 17(C), pages 217-236.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:agiwat:v:145:y:2014:i:c:p:39-49. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/agwat .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.