IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v11y2019i9p2548-d227790.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Determination of the Agricultural Eco-Compensation Standards in Ecological Fragile Poverty Areas Based on Emergy Synthesis

Author

Listed:
  • Yang Gao

    (College of Land Science and Technology, China Agricultural University, Beijing 100193, China)

  • Ziyan Han

    (College of Urban and Environmental Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100087, China)

  • Yanzhi Cui

    (Sino-Japan Friendship Center for Environmental Protection, Beijing 100029, China)

  • Hanbing Zhang

    (College of Urban and Environmental Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100087, China)

  • Lulu Liu

    (College of Land Science and Technology, China Agricultural University, Beijing 100193, China)

Abstract

Eco-compensation is an important mechanism when applying the theory of ecosystem services to practical development, which translates the external and non-market value of the environment into real financial incentives for local actors. Scientifically formulating feasible and credible compensation standards is the most critical and key step to adjusting the benefits received by environment protectors and beneficiaries. The Inner Mongolia agro-pastoral zone is an important ecological area with an undeveloped economy in Northern China. The implementation of eco-compensation policies contributes to ecological restoration and poverty alleviation. Taking Horqin Left Back Banner, Inner Mongolia, China as a study case, a quantitative model of a non-point source pollution eco-compensation program was established by using emergy synthesis—a thermodynamics-based method in ecological economic systems—to create a comprehensive eco-compensation standard. The results showed that the eco-compensation amounts for non-point source pollution were generally below 10% of the regional gross domestic product (GDP). A 11–20% reduction in fertilizer would be accepted according to the field investigation and the optimal eco-compensation strategy reduced the phosphate fertilizer application by 20% with a compensation standard of $379.63/ha/year, which was similar to the farmers’ willingness to accept compensation. For the accurate creation of a non-point source pollution eco-compensation program, the emergy synthesis overcomes the inconsistency in the quantification of the material flow, ecological flow, and economic flow, guaranteeing the sustainable implementation of non-point source pollution eco-compensation projects.

Suggested Citation

  • Yang Gao & Ziyan Han & Yanzhi Cui & Hanbing Zhang & Lulu Liu, 2019. "Determination of the Agricultural Eco-Compensation Standards in Ecological Fragile Poverty Areas Based on Emergy Synthesis," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(9), pages 1-18, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:11:y:2019:i:9:p:2548-:d:227790
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/9/2548/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/9/2548/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Engel, Stefanie & Pagiola, Stefano & Wunder, Sven, 2008. "Designing payments for environmental services in theory and practice: An overview of the issues," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 65(4), pages 663-674, May.
    2. Moran, Dominic & McVittie, Alistair & Allcroft, David J. & Elston, David A., 2007. "Quantifying public preferences for agri-environmental policy in Scotland: A comparison of methods," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(1), pages 42-53, June.
    3. Zhang, Yan & Yang, Zhifeng & Yu, Xiangyi, 2009. "Evaluation of urban metabolism based on emergy synthesis: A case study for Beijing (China)," Ecological Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 220(13), pages 1690-1696.
    4. Bennett, Michael T. & Gong, Yazhen & Scarpa, Riccardo, 2018. "Hungry Birds and Angry Farmers: Using Choice Experiments to Assess “Eco-compensation” for Coastal Wetlands Protection in China," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 154(C), pages 71-87.
    5. Vatn Arild & Bromley Daniel W., 1994. "Choices without Prices without Apologies," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 26(2), pages 129-148, March.
    6. Brown, Mark T. & Ulgiati, Sergio, 2010. "Updated evaluation of exergy and emergy driving the geobiosphere: A review and refinement of the emergy baseline," Ecological Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 221(20), pages 2501-2508.
    7. Kemkes, Robin J. & Farley, Joshua & Koliba, Christopher J., 2010. "Determining when payments are an effective policy approach to ecosystem service provision," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(11), pages 2069-2074, September.
    8. Liu, Moucheng & Liu, Weiwei & Yang, Lun & Jiao, Wenjun & He, Siyuan & Min, Qingwen, 2019. "A dynamic eco-compensation standard for Hani Rice Terraces System in southwest China," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 36(C), pages 1-1.
    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. Jia He & Yi Li & Lianjun Zhang & Junyin Tan & Chuanhao Wen, 2021. "A County-Scale Spillover Ecological Value Compensation Standard of Ecological Barrier Area in China: Based on an Extended Emergy Analysis," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 11(12), pages 1-26, November.
    2. Zhang, Can & Su, Bo & Beckmann, Michael & Volk, Martin, 2024. "Emergy-based evaluation of ecosystem services: Progress and perspectives," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 192(C).
    3. Hu, Yuan & Kuhn, Lena & Zheng, Wenxue, 2021. "Promote or Inhibit？the Effects of Forest Carbon Sinks Projects on Agricultural Development: Evidence from Sichuan, China," 2021 Conference, August 17-31, 2021, Virtual 315381, International Association of Agricultural Economists.
    4. Weiguo Fan & Nan Chen & Wei Yao & Mengmeng Meng & Xuechao Wang, 2021. "Integrating Environmental Impact and Ecosystem Services in the Process of Land Resource Capitalization—A Case Study of Land Transfer in Fuping, Hebei," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(5), pages 1-18, March.

    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. Farley, Joshua & Costanza, Robert, 2010. "Payments for ecosystem services: From local to global," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(11), pages 2060-2068, September.
    2. Galati, Antonino & Crescimanno, Maria & Gristina, Luciano & Keesstra, Saskia & Novara, Agata, 2016. "Actual provision as an alternative criterion to improve the efficiency of payments for ecosystem services for C sequestration in semiarid vineyards," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 144(C), pages 58-64.
    3. Smith, Helen F. & Sullivan, Caroline A., 2014. "Ecosystem services within agricultural landscapes—Farmers' perceptions," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 98(C), pages 72-80.
    4. Rodríguez-Ortega, T. & Olaizola, A.M. & Bernués, A., 2018. "A novel management-based system of payments for ecosystem services for targeted agri-environmental policy," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 34(PA), pages 74-84.
    5. Kosoy, Nicolás & Corbera, Esteve, 2010. "Payments for ecosystem services as commodity fetishism," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(6), pages 1228-1236, April.
    6. Pham, Thu Thuy & Loft, Lasse & Bennett, Karen & Phuong, Vu Tan & Dung, Le Ngoc & Brunner, Jake, 2015. "Monitoring and evaluation of Payment for Forest Environmental Services in Vietnam: From myth to reality," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 16(C), pages 220-229.
    7. Mangubhai, Sangeeta & Sykes, Helen & Manley, Marita & Vukikomoala, Kiji & Beattie, Madeline, 2020. "Contributions of tourism-based Marine Conservation Agreements to natural resource management in Fiji," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 171(C).
    8. Sattler, Claudia & Trampnau, Susanne & Schomers, Sarah & Meyer, Claas & Matzdorf, Bettina, 2013. "Multi-classification of payments for ecosystem services: How do classification characteristics relate to overall PES success?," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 6(C), pages 31-45.
    9. Báliková, Klára & Šálka, Jaroslav, 2022. "Are silvicultural subsidies an effective payment for ecosystem services in Slovakia?," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 116(C).
    10. Qinxin Guo & Junyi Shen, 2020. "Valuing Rural Residents' Attitude Regarding agri-environmental Policy in China: A Best-worst Scaling Analysis," Discussion Paper Series DP2020-01, Research Institute for Economics & Business Administration, Kobe University.
    11. Kaczan, David & Swallow, Brent M. & Adamowicz, Wiktor L., 2011. "Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES) scheme design in rural Tanzania: Famers’ preferences for enforcement and payment options," 2011 Annual Meeting, July 24-26, 2011, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 103673, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    12. Xiaoyu Song & Yuqing Liu & Fanglei Zhong & Xiaohong Deng & Yuan Qi & Jinlong Zhang & Rong Zhang & Yongnian Zhang, 2020. "Payment Criteria and Mode for Watershed Ecosystem Services: A Case Study of the Heihe River Basin, Northwest China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(15), pages 1-12, July.
    13. Gómez-Baggethun, Erik & de Groot, Rudolf & Lomas, Pedro L. & Montes, Carlos, 2010. "The history of ecosystem services in economic theory and practice: From early notions to markets and payment schemes," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(6), pages 1209-1218, April.
    14. Fang, Wei & An, Haizhong & Li, Huajiao & Gao, Xiangyun & Sun, Xiaoqi & Zhong, Weiqiong, 2017. "Accessing on the sustainability of urban ecological-economic systems by means of a coupled emergy and system dynamics model: A case study of Beijing," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 100(C), pages 326-337.
    15. Kristin Nicolaus & Jens Jetzkowitz, 2014. "How Does Paying for Ecosystem Services Contribute to Sustainable Development? Evidence from Case Study Research in Germany and the UK," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 6(5), pages 1-24, May.
    16. Kolinjivadi, Vijay & Adamowski, Jan & Kosoy, Nicolás, 2014. "Recasting payments for ecosystem services (PES) in water resource management: A novel institutional approach," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 10(C), pages 144-154.
    17. Schomers, Sarah & Matzdorf, Bettina, 2013. "Payments for ecosystem services: A review and comparison of developing and industrialized countries," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 6(C), pages 16-30.
    18. Yan, Haiming & Yang, Huicai & Guo, Xiaonan & Zhao, Shuqin & Jiang, Qun'ou, 2022. "Payments for ecosystem services as an essential approach to improving ecosystem services: A review," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 201(C).
    19. Ingram, Jane Carter & Wilkie, David & Clements, Tom & McNab, Roan Balas & Nelson, Fred & Baur, Erick Hogan & Sachedina, Hassanali T. & Peterson, David Dean & Foley, Charles Andrew Harold, 2014. "Evidence of Payments for Ecosystem Services as a mechanism for supporting biodiversity conservation and rural livelihoods," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 7(C), pages 10-21.
    20. Farley, Joshua & Schmitt, Abdon & Burke, Matthew & Farr, Marigo, 2015. "Extending market allocation to ecosystem services: Moral and practical implications on a full and unequal planet," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 244-252.

    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:gam:jsusta:v:11:y:2019:i:9:p:2548-:d:227790. 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: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    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.