Communal governance, equity and payment for ecosystem services

Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES) presents a number of complex equity concerns when implemented in the context of communal resource management. This analysis contributes to our understanding of intracommunity equity and the role of communal governance in determining distributional equity outcomes, specifically in collective PES arrangements. The study examines the relationship between local governance and the distribution of collective payments in an Ecuadorian payment for conservation program implemented in communities in the Andean highlands. We use data from approximately 200 households living in six participating communities to examine how communities distribute collective payments across community members, and identify the household and communal attributes that influence (i) the likelihood that a household will receive a benefit, (ii) perceive the distribution of benefits to be fair, and (iii) perceive that the PES program itself is fair. The results highlight the important role of communal governance mechanisms in promoting participatory and transparent decision processes, and the resultant distribution of benefits. Households in more organized communities are more likely to receive a benefit and are more likely to perceive that the distribution is fair. In contrast, those in less organized communities are less likely to have budgetary information or agree with how the collective payment is spent. The results also indicate that communities generally distribute the benefits based on egalitarian principles and point to a potential disjuncture between communal equity principles and the individual costs incurred under the PES program land-use restrictions. Findings suggest that PES practitioners and researchers pay greater attention to, and support, the governance capacities of communities prior to implementing a PES program. The findings also call attention to the potential conflict between PES distributional principles and communal distributional norms.