IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/teepxx/v6y2017i1p96-106.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The simple but not-too-simple valuation of ecosystem services: basic principles and an illustrative example

Author

Listed:
  • R. David Simpson

Abstract

Albert Einstein is reputed to have said ‘Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler.’ This is good advice for valuing ecosystem services. The fundamental principle of economic valuation is simple, but powerful: value is determined on the margin. This means that context is crucial in estimating ecosystem service values and, therefore, ‘benefit transfer’ exercises that fail to account for location and relative abundance are, at best, meaningless, and at worst, counterproductive. I illustrate the principles of valuation with the example of water purification by riparian buffers. Values can differ greatly over even relatively small areas, and some ostensibly paradoxical results can arise.

Suggested Citation

  • R. David Simpson, 2017. "The simple but not-too-simple valuation of ecosystem services: basic principles and an illustrative example," Journal of Environmental Economics and Policy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 6(1), pages 96-106, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:teepxx:v:6:y:2017:i:1:p:96-106
    DOI: 10.1080/21606544.2016.1184594
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/21606544.2016.1184594
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/21606544.2016.1184594?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. Dextre, Rosa María & Eschenhagen, María Luisa & Camacho Hernández, Mirtha & Rangecroft, Sally & Clason, Caroline & Couldrick, Laurence & Morera, Sergio, 2022. "Payment for ecosystem services in Peru: Assessing the socio-ecological dimension of water services in the upper Santa River basin," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 56(C).
    2. R. David Simpson, 2019. "Conservation Incentives from an Ecosystem Service: How Much Farmland Might Be Devoted to Native Pollinators?," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 73(2), pages 661-678, June.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:taf:teepxx:v:6:y:2017:i:1:p:96-106. 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: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/teep20 .

    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.