How much are Mediterranean forests worth?

Mediterranean forests provide a wide array of benefits; however, most of them are poorly recognized. This paper presents the results of a study, that attempts to value comprehensively all forest benefits in Mediterranean countries. Its objective is to arrive at a rough order of magnitude of total forest value in each country and in the Mediterranean region as a whole, and of the composition of this value, using available data. Forest benefits are identified based on a common framework and valued using a range of methods. The results, although constrained by data limitations in some cases, show the absolute and relative importance of the different forest benefits, and how they vary across countries. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.