IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ecolec/v90y2013icp1-9.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The evolution and empirical estimation of ecological-economic production possibilities frontiers

Author

Listed:
  • Bekele, Elias G.
  • Lant, Christopher L.
  • Soman, Sethuram
  • Misgna, Girmay

Abstract

This paper presents a graphical model of an ecological-economic production possibilities frontier (EEPPF) that explicitly considers the roles of market failure and technological asymmetry in the provision of ecosystem goods and services. An empirical example of a 6-dimensional EEPPF is provided using a watershed in Illinois where three provisioning ecosystem services (corn, soybeans, hay) and three regulating services (flood control, water quality, and carbon retention) are the objectives. When aggregated, provisioning and regulatory services form a linear-to-convex EEPPF, but regulatory services can be increased from 10 to over 90% of optimal with a reduction in provisioning services (crops) from 100 to 78% of optimal. While corn and soybeans are shown to form a trade-off with all other ecosystem services, hay is complementary with flood control, water quality and carbon retention. These three regulating services are complementary with one another, with water quality and carbon correlated at 0.80. These results demonstrate the use of GIS, distributed watershed models such as SWAT, and genetic algorithms as a valuable method to estimate empirical EEPPFs.

Suggested Citation

  • Bekele, Elias G. & Lant, Christopher L. & Soman, Sethuram & Misgna, Girmay, 2013. "The evolution and empirical estimation of ecological-economic production possibilities frontiers," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 1-9.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecolec:v:90:y:2013:i:c:p:1-9
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2013.02.012
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800913000736
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.ecolecon.2013.02.012?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.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Wossink, Ada & Swinton, Scott M., 2007. "Jointness in production and farmers' willingness to supply non-marketed ecosystem services," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(2), pages 297-304, December.
    2. Haight, Alan Day, 2007. "Diagram for a small planet: The Production and Ecosystem Possibilities Curve," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(1), pages 224-232, October.
    3. Mark E. Lichtenstein & Claire A. Montgomery, 2003. "Biodiversity and Timber in the Coast Range of Oregon: Inside the Production Possibility Frontier," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 79(1), pages 56-73.
    4. Bjorklund, Johanna & Limburg, Karin E. & Rydberg, Torbjorn, 1999. "Impact of production intensity on the ability of the agricultural landscape to generate ecosystem services: an example from Sweden," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(2), pages 269-291, May.
    5. David Tilman & Kenneth G. Cassman & Pamela A. Matson & Rosamond Naylor & Stephen Polasky, 2002. "Agricultural sustainability and intensive production practices," Nature, Nature, vol. 418(6898), pages 671-677, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

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


    Cited by:

    1. Jacobs, Sander & Martín-López, Berta & Barton, David N. & Dunford, Robert & Harrison, Paula A. & Kelemen, Eszter & Saarikoski, Heli & Termansen, Mette & García-Llorente, Marina & Gómez-Baggethun, Erik, 2018. "The means determine the end – Pursuing integrated valuation in practice," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 29(PC), pages 515-528.
    2. Joly, Frédéric & Benoit, Marc & Martin, Raphael & Dumont, Bertrand, 2021. "Biological operability, a new concept based on ergonomics to assess the pertinence of ecosystem services optimization practices," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 50(C).
    3. Konrad, Maria Theresia & Nielsen, Helle Ørsted & Pedersen, Anders Branth & Elofsson, Katarina, 2019. "Drivers of Farmers' Investments in Nutrient Abatement Technologies in Five Baltic Sea Countries," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 159(C), pages 91-100.
    4. Bagdon, Benjamin A. & Huang, Ching-Hsun & Dewhurst, Stephen & Meador, Andrew Sánchez, 2017. "Climate Change Constrains the Efficiency Frontier When Managing Forests to Reduce Fire Severity and Maximize Carbon Storage," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 140(C), pages 201-214.
    5. Barbara Langlois & Vincent Martinet, 2023. "Defining cost-effective ways to improve ecosystem services provision in agroecosystems," Review of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Studies, Springer, vol. 104(2), pages 123-165, June.
    6. Blachly, Ben & Sims, Charles & Warziniack, Travis, 2024. "Ecosystem complementarities: Evidence from over 700 U.S. watersheds," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 219(C).
    7. Konrad, Maria Theresia & Hansen, Line Block & Levin, Gregor & Blicher-Mathiesen, Gitte & Andersen, Hans Estrup & Martinsen, Louise & Hasler, Berit, 2022. "Targeted regulation of nitrogen loads: A national, cross-sectoral analysis," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 193(C).
    8. Vallet, Améline & Locatelli, Bruno & Levrel, Harold & Wunder, Sven & Seppelt, Ralf & Scholes, Robert J. & Oszwald, Johan, 2018. "Relationships Between Ecosystem Services: Comparing Methods for Assessing Tradeoffs and Synergies," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 150(C), pages 96-106.
    9. Travis W. Warziniack & Kenneth Bagstad & Michael Knowles & Christopher Mihiar & Arpita Nehra & Charles Rhodes & Leslie Sanchez & Christopher Sichko & Charles B. Sims, 2024. "Natural Capital Accounting on Forested Lands in the United States: An Application to the Colorado River Basin," NBER Chapters, in: Measuring and Accounting for Environmental Public Goods: A National Accounts Perspective, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Christopher Lant & Suman Paudel & Kaeli Mueller & Grace Larson & Gustavo A. Ovando-Montejo & Jennifer Givens, 2023. "Allocation of U.S. Biomass Production to Food, Feed, Fiber, Fuel and Exports," Land, MDPI, vol. 12(3), pages 1-16, March.
    11. Deng Ding & David Bennett & Silvia Secchi, 2015. "Investigating Impacts of Alternative Crop Market Scenarios on Land Use Change with an Agent-Based Model," Land, MDPI, vol. 4(4), pages 1-28, November.
    12. Warziniack, Travis & Sims, Charles & Haas, Jessica, 2019. "Fire and the joint production of ecosystem services: A spatial-dynamic optimization approach," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 1-1.
    13. Kanter, David R. & Musumba, Mark & Wood, Sylvia L.R. & Palm, Cheryl & Antle, John & Balvanera, Patricia & Dale, Virginia H. & Havlik, Petr & Kline, Keith L. & Scholes, R.J. & Thornton, Philip & Titton, 2018. "Evaluating agricultural trade-offs in the age of sustainable development," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 163(C), pages 73-88.
    14. Haas, Henrique & Kalin, Latif & Yen, Haw, 2024. "Improved forest canopy evaporation leads to better predictions of ecohydrological processes," Ecological Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 489(C).
    15. Renats Trubins, 2023. "Trade-Offs in Ecosystem Services: Clarifying Concepts and Measuring Severity within the Production Possibility Frontier Framework," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(24), pages 1-10, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Stallman, Heidi R., 2011. "Ecosystem services in agriculture: Determining suitability for provision by collective management," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 131-139.
    2. Sauer, Johannes & Wossink, Ada, 2010. "The Marginal Cost Of Agri-Environmental Services," 50th Annual Conference, Braunschweig, Germany, September 29-October 1, 2010 93939, German Association of Agricultural Economists (GEWISOLA).
    3. Lant, Christopher L. & Kraft, Steven E. & Beaulieu, Jeffrey & Bennett, David & Loftus, Timothy & Nicklow, John, 2005. "Using GIS-based ecological-economic modeling to evaluate policies affecting agricultural watersheds," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(4), pages 467-484, December.
    4. Sundkvist, Asa & Milestad, Rebecka & Jansson, AnnMari, 2005. "On the importance of tightening feedback loops for sustainable development of food systems," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 30(2), pages 224-239, April.
    5. Renats Trubins, 2023. "Trade-Offs in Ecosystem Services: Clarifying Concepts and Measuring Severity within the Production Possibility Frontier Framework," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(24), pages 1-10, December.
    6. Wossink, Ada & Swinton, Scott M., 2007. "Jointness in production and farmers' willingness to supply non-marketed ecosystem services," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(2), pages 297-304, December.
    7. Turner, Katrine Grace & Anderson, Sharolyn & Gonzales-Chang, Mauricio & Costanza, Robert & Courville, Sasha & Dalgaard, Tommy & Dominati, Estelle & Kubiszewski, Ida & Ogilvy, Sue & Porfirio, Luciana &, 2016. "A review of methods, data, and models to assess changes in the value of ecosystem services from land degradation and restoration," Ecological Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 319(C), pages 190-207.
    8. Bethwell, Claudia & Sattler, Claudia & Stachow, Ulrich, 2022. "An analytical framework to link governance, agricultural production practices, and the provision of ecosystem services in agricultural landscapes," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 53(C).
    9. Sauer, J. & Wossink, A., 2011. "The Marginal Cost of Agro-Enviroment Services," Proceedings “Schriften der Gesellschaft für Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften des Landbaues e.V.”, German Association of Agricultural Economists (GEWISOLA), vol. 46, March.
    10. Elisa Morri & Riccardo Santolini, 2021. "Ecosystem Services Valuation for the Sustainable Land Use Management by Nature-Based Solution (NbS) in the Common Agricultural Policy Actions: A Case Study on the Foglia River Basin (Marche Region, It," Land, MDPI, vol. 11(1), pages 1-23, December.
    11. Katarina Arvidsson Segerkvist & Helena Hansson & Ulf Sonesson & Stefan Gunnarsson, 2021. "A Systematic Mapping of Current Literature on Sustainability at Farm-Level in Beef and Lamb Meat Production," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(5), pages 1-14, February.
    12. Hualin Xie & Yingqian Huang & Qianru Chen & Yanwei Zhang & Qing Wu, 2019. "Prospects for Agricultural Sustainable Intensification: A Review of Research," Land, MDPI, vol. 8(11), pages 1-27, October.
    13. Smith, Helen F. & Sullivan, Caroline A., 2014. "Ecosystem services within agricultural landscapes—Farmers' perceptions," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 98(C), pages 72-80.
    14. Aude Ridier & Caroline Roussy & Karim Chaib, 2021. "Adoption of crop diversification by specialized grain farmers in south-western France: evidence from a choice-modelling experiment," Review of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Studies, Springer, vol. 102(3), pages 265-283, September.
    15. Paul L. G. Vlek & Asia Khamzina & Hossein Azadi & Anik Bhaduri & Luna Bharati & Ademola Braimoh & Christopher Martius & Terry Sunderland & Fatemeh Taheri, 2017. "Trade-Offs in Multi-Purpose Land Use under Land Degradation," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(12), pages 1-19, November.
    16. Barbara Langlois & Vincent Martinet, 2023. "Defining cost-effective ways to improve ecosystem services provision in agroecosystems," Review of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Studies, Springer, vol. 104(2), pages 123-165, June.
    17. Diriba Shiferaw G., 2017. "Water-Nutrients Interaction: Exploring the Effects of Water as a Central Role for Availability & Use Efficiency of Nutrients by Shallow Rooted Vegetable Crops - A Review," Journal of Agriculture and Crops, Academic Research Publishing Group, vol. 3(10), pages 78-93, 10-2017.
    18. Sheng Gong & Jason.S. Bergtold & Elizabeth Yeager, 2021. "Assessing the joint adoption and complementarity between in-field conservation practices of Kansas farmers," Agricultural and Food Economics, Springer;Italian Society of Agricultural Economics (SIDEA), vol. 9(1), pages 1-24, December.
    19. Seufert, Verena & Ramankutty, Navin & Mayerhofer, Tabea, 2017. "What is this thing called organic? – How organic farming is codified in regulations," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 10-20.
    20. Kataki, Sampriti & West, Helen & Clarke, Michèle & Baruah, D.C., 2016. "Phosphorus recovery as struvite: Recent concerns for use of seed, alternative Mg source, nitrogen conservation and fertilizer potential," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 142-156.

    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:ecolec:v:90:y:2013:i:c:p:1-9. 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.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with 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/ecolecon .

    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.