Communities perceptions and knowledge of ecosystem services: Evidence from rural communities in Nigeria Wei Zhang, Research Follow, IFPRI Contributing authors: Edward Kato, Prapti Bhandary, Ephraim Nkonya, Hassan I. Ibrahim, Mure U. Agbonlahor, Hussaini Y. Ibrahim Workshop on Institutions for Ecosystem Services, October 27-29, 2014, IFPRI, Washington DC
The team: 2
Introduction Growing demand for managing ES provided by alternative land uses to enhance local livelihoods and well-being, ultimately contributing towards conservation objectives and poverty reduction. Additionally, the sustainable development and Green Economy efforts, which emphasize integration and balanced consideration of social, economic and environmental objectives, have raised the need for better understanding ES. Research on local farmers appreciation of ES and land uses that provide these services can provide insights into the interplay of the innate linkages between humans and their environment. This in turn can facilitate fuller integration of ES information into planning and management and contribute towards identifying ways to improve land use management and designing effective incentives for promoting ES provision. 3
Introduction Decision analysis studies with input from sociology and psychology indicate that land use preferences are influenced by a variety of motives (including financial and non-financial), attitudes and values intrinsic to every individual decision-making. Knowledge can affect attitudes and behavioral intentions. Positive attitude towards the environment is predictive of conservation practices. Cognitive awareness and appreciation can also be shaped by physical exposure to or experience with the environment. 4
Introduction Perspectives of people about the benefit they experience from ecosystems are associated with the ecological and social features of the landscapes in which they are located, as well as who they are in terms of, for instance, wealth, education, values/belief, culture and tradition. Understanding stakeholders diverse points of view within their differing contexts offers a valuable means of gaining insight into the opportunities and constraints that face ES management in multi-use landscapes, which in turn facilities the implementation of strategies that aim to improve the capacity of the poor to draw from vital ES from landscapes. 5
Research Objectives Credit: W. Zhang 6
Uses primary data collected from a survey of 102 rural communities between 2012/11-2013/02 to: 1. Assess local communities awareness and knowledge of ES and identify land uses within landscapes that provide the appreciated ES 2. Explore local communities perceptions of the recognized ES and basic attitudes toward the Payment for Environmental Services (PES) approach to resolving natural resource use and environmental conflicts 3. Examine the association between awareness level and land uses within landscapes and gain an understanding of the socioeconomic factors that help predicting the awareness levels across communities. 7
Credit: W. Zhang Methodology 8
Data collection linked to the mid-line survey sample from FADAMA III FADAMA III project: World Bank-supported national community-driven development project in Nigeria Stratified sampling: 12 States Poverty and natural resource pressure Three Agro-ecological zones represented North-eastern states excluded due to security concern Randomly selected 6-10 villages/state A total of 102 villages 9
Location of Surveyed Communities 102 villages: Humid Forest (34) Guinea Savannah (36) Sudan Savannah (32) 10
Survey questionnaire Farmers perceptions and knowledge of ES were elicited using structured group interviews (carried out during Nov 2012 Feb 2013). 29 services: 10 provisioning services 11 regulating and supporting services 8 cultural services Open answer option: Other (specify) Villages are proxies for landscapes. Community *rapid* land use assessment : 9 land uses in the villages represent common landscape elements: cultivated land, unused land, residential area, forest, agro-forest, lowland floodplain, grazing land, woodland, and water. Other (specify) option allowed additional land use types. 11
Use of field guide for insect pests, natural enemies, and pollinators in main crops to assist the identification of insects by farmers Credit: W. Zhang 12
Credit: M. Agbonlahor Credit: M. Agbonlahor 13
Credit: M. Agbonlahor Credit: W. van der Werf
Analysis methods Descriptive analysis to describe general patterns in communities land use, perceptions and knowledge of ES Multiple regression models to examine the relationships bet. awareness and land uses and socio-economic factors, with a focus on the effect of land uses Address associative relationships, as opposed to causal effects Four ES awareness indices measured as the number of identified services over the total number of services for: i) all services combined, ii) provisioning, iii) regulating and supporting, and iv) cultural services. Estimated two models: Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) model and Generalized Linear Model (GLM). Akaike s Information Criteria (AIC) used to facilitate the selection of preferred models across alternative specifications 15
Results Credit: M. Agbonlahor 16
Community land uses: Percentage of village land area and percentage of villages reporting trend of change in the last five years (N=102) Land use types Humid Forest (N=34) % of total area Guinea Savannah (N=36) Sudan Savannah (N=32) Trend % of Trend % of Trend total total area Cultivated 20.4 1 0 33 32.9 6 5 24 52.9 28 2 2 Unused 36.5 33 0 0 22.7 22 3 0 0.9 2 2 1 Residential 6.2 0 0 34 13.5 6 1 28 18.2 1 4 26 Forest 19.9 30 2 0 12.2 17 5 1 3.0 1 8 0 Lowland floodplain area 8.6 31 1 2 8.7 20 11 4 14.9 16 6 7 Grazing 0 0 0 0 1.1 5 2 0 2.5 4 7 0 Woodland 6 19 1 0 6 12 3 3 1.2 3 3 0 Water 2.7 0 6 0 2.6 8 8 1 6.5 17 5 9 Agro-forest dropped, N=1 17
Awareness of provisioning services by villages Ecosystem Services % of villages that are aware of the ES Crops 100 Wild foods (plants, fish, animal) 87 Aqua-cultural fish 52 Livestock 74 Livestock feed 77 Fuel 99 Genetic resources 4 Fresh water 90 Ornamental resources 31 Natural/plant derived medicine 97 18
Awareness of regulating and supporting services by villages Ecosystem Services % of villages that are aware of the ES Regulation of air quality 54 Water purification 6 Regulation of disease & pests 2 Pollination 10 Erosion regulation 16 Waste treatment 8 Natural hazard regulation 42 Climate regulation 8 Nutrient cycling 0 Noise buffering 10 Soil formation 10 19
Awareness of cultural services by villages Ecosystem Services % of villages that are aware of the ES Spiritual values 59 Aesthetic values 38 Sense of place 14 Recreation 34 Ecotourism 0 Cultural heritage 16 Cultural practices 12 Education and knowledge Systems 12 20
Indices of ES awareness across AEZs 0.8 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 All Provisioning Regulating/Supporting Cultural Humid Forest Guinea Savannah Sudan Savannah 21
Perceived linkages between ES and land uses Linkages villages made between ES and land uses Unable to relate regulating and supporting ES to specific land uses well Cultivated land viewed by many as important source of cultural services such as spiritual and aesthetic values People often have multiple uses for their land. For example, cultivated land provide many provisioning services than just crops. Despite the widely perceived importance of ES and declining trend for service provision, the majority of the villages have taken little action to maintain the service provision or halt or reverse decline. Sustainable land management (SLM) cited by over >20% of the villages as a way to maintain crop production levels. 10% used tree planting to help manage the provision of natural/plant-derived medicines and natural hazard regulation service Community NRM practices (e.g., enactment and enforcement of user byelaws) were mentioned by only a few villages. 22
Knowledge about pest control and pollination services KNOWLEDGE OF NATURAL ENEMIES OF CROP PESTS Yes 18% Majority didn t think natural enemies were important for controlling crop pests Aware of the service of regulation of disease and pests Yes 2% No 67% No 82% KNOWLEDGE OF POLLINATORS Yes 33% Majority didn t make any linkage bet. crop yields & pollinator populations and were unaware of practices that enhance pollinator populations No 98% Aware of the service of pollination No 90% Yes 10% Villages were unable to link the provision of pest control & pollination services to surrounding 23 habitats and other resources provided by land uses.
Payment for Environmental Services One-third of the villages believed that PES can be useful for reducing natural resource conflict and improving natural resource management. For those who rejected the approach, the most cited reasons appear to be both ethically or practically grounded. Preferred settling on negotiated rules or terms and government intervention over financial means Many did not believe the method would work due to breached agreement and poverty Hypothetical case in which the quality of the community s drinking water is affected by upstream communities: 15% would consider paying the upstream communities to change behavior. For those who rejected the PES approach, 68% preferred negotiation with upstream communities and 25% chose to request local government to intervene. 24
Key parameter estimates: All services combined GLM1 GLM2 GLM3 OLS1 OLS2 OLS3 Main ethnicity: Hausa +++ +++ +++ +++ +++ +++ Main ethnicity: Yoruba Unused land (area %) ++ ++ ++ ++ ++ ++ Residential land (area %) ++ ++ ++ ++ ++ ++ Forest (area %) +++ +++ +++ +++ +++ +++ Floodplain (area %) +++ +++ +++ +++ +++ +++ Grazing land (area %) Woodland (area %) + + + Water (area %) % of HHs food-insecure - - - % of adult literacy No. of conflicts Distance to roads Observations 101 101 101 101 101 101 R-squared 0.446 0.449 0.449 Adjusted R-squared 0.290 0.284 0.285 aic 1.319 1.338 1.338 Log likelihood -43.60-43.59-43.59 104.4 104.6 104.7 25
Key parameter estimates: Provisioning services GLM1 GLM2 GLM3 GLM1 GLM2 GLM3 Main ethnicity: Hausa Main ethnicity: Yoruba Unused land (area %) Residential land (area %) Forest (area %) Floodplain (area %) + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Grazing land (area %) Woodland (area %) Water (area %) % of HHs food-insecure % of adult literacy No. of conflicts Distance to roads Observations 101 101 101 101 101 101 R-squared 0.320 0.324 0.326 Adjusted R-squared 0.128 0.122 0.125 aic 1.267 1.286 1.286 Log likelihood -40.99-40.96-40.96 67.66 67.95 68.10 26
Key parameter estimates: Regulating and supporting services GLM1 GLM2 GLM3 OLS1 OLS2 OLS3 Main ethnicity: Hausa + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Main ethnicity: Yoruba Unused land (area %) + + + + + + + + + Residential land (area %) + + + + + + + + + Forest (area %) + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Floodplain (area %) + + + + + + Grazing land (area %) Woodland (area %) + + + Water (area %) - - - - - - - - - % of HHs food-insecure - - - - - - - % of adult literacy - - - - - - - - - - - - No. of conflicts Distance to roads Observations 101 101 101 101 101 101 R-squared 0.339 0.340 0.339 Adjusted R-squared 0.153 0.143 0.142 aic 1.030 1.049 1.050 Log likelihood -29.00-28.96-29.00 68.50 68.58 68.50
Key parameter estimates: Cultural services GLM1 GLM2 GLM3 OLS1 OLS2 OLS3 Main ethnicity: Hausa + + + + + + Main ethnicity: Yoruba Unused land (area %) + + + + + + + + + Residential land (area %) + + Forest (area %) + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Floodplain (area %) + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Grazing land (area %) Woodland (area %) Water (area %) % of HHs food-insecure - - - - - % of adult literacy No. of conflicts Distance to roads + + + + + Observations 101 101 101 101 101 101 R-squared 0.379 0.396 0.380 Adjusted R-squared 0.203 0.215 0.194 aic 1.175 1.190 1.194 Log likelihood -36.32-36.11-36.31 50.96 52.35 51.0428
Credit: M. Agbonlahor Policy implications 29
Policy Implications There remains much to be done to increase rural population s awareness and knowledge of ES and the resource base that underlines the provision of services Use of extension services extension was not found to play significant role in influencing communities overall levels of awareness, pointing to a crucial entry point for intervention. More targeted effort by extension agency is recommended to mainstream ES-based approaches to sustainable agricultural intensification and natural resource management into their support program. 30
Policy Implications Enhancing ES education through formal school curriculum may be promising. Including in primary school curriculum key messages about ES and the ecological structures and processes that underline them therefore may lead to rewarding results on raising knowledge about ES. Findings demonstrate the importance of direct experience and local context in shaping people s perceptions toward ES. Such considerations should be taken into account when designing policies aimed at addressing natural resources and environmental management issues. Need to respect local communities demand and preferences when designing policy or incentive schemes. 31
32 Credit: van der Werf