Opportunity costs of conservation in a biodiversity hotspot: the case of southern Bahia

Abstract

Biodiversity 'hotspot' areas, which are characterized by concentrations of endemic species and severe anthropogenic loss of natural habitat, might be thought * Corresponding author. The property survey was carried out by IESB under a grant from PROBlO, which supported also the interpretation of the land cover data by E.C. Landau and colleagues. The World Bank's Research Support Board supported the data analysis reported here, compilation of the vegetation maps by W. Wayt Thomas and André M.de Carvalho, and (with supplementary funding from the Rain Forest Trust) supported digitization of the land capabilities data. We are grateful to IBGE for making those data available and to David Stoms at

Flow and rent-based opportunity costs of water ecosystem service provision in a complex farming system

“…The median flow estimate represents a more stable and long-term figure for the study site. This estimate is also in line with the opportunity costs (ranging between US$39 and US$509) reported for similar land-use types (Cacho et al 2005, Chomitz et al 2005, Börner and Wunder 2008, Bottcher et al 2009). …”

“…The opportunity cost literature uses approaches like net returns from land uses, proxies obtained from land attributes, and land prices for estimating opportunity costs, and more recently screening contracts and procurement auctions have also been used http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol21/iss4/art36/ (e.g., Borrego and Skutsch 2014, Chomitz et al 2005, Jack et al 2009, Naidoo and Adamowicz 2006, Wünscher et al 2011). These methods have been used to calculate the cost of conservation, to assess trade-offs in land allocation, and to design PES schemes (Pagiola and Bosquet 2009).…”

“…Traditional approaches to opportunity cost estimation also tend to assume that opportunity costs can be estimated from proxies, such as land attributes (Hunt 2010, Fisher et al 2011a and land market prices (Chomitz et al 2005). This is usually an oversimplification because opportunity costs are likely to vary spatially (e.g., with land use, accessibility, distance to water, plot size, altitude) and according to socio-demographics of landholders (e.g., age, gender, schooling, household size).…”

Interaction effects between economic development and forest cover determine deforestation rates

“…More sinisterly, the individuals in power may be exploiting the forests for personal gain (Meyer et al, 2003;Smith J. et al, 2003;Laurance, 2004), with no regard for the long-term future of the nation's natural resources. It could also be that some forested lands are more economically valuable to poor nations if they are converted to other landuses (Byrne et al, 1996;Wilkie et al, 2001;Meyer et al, 2003;Chomitz et al, 2005). Many of these issues are not present (or at least are less prevalent) in wealthy nations that typically have stronger central governments with lower levels of corruption (Lo´pez and Mitra, 2000;Smith R.J. et al, 2003;Laurance, 2004) and a public that does not depend on the constant opening up of new agricultural lands to generate wealth.…”

Revision of the Neotropical trahiras of the Hoplias lacerdae species-group (Ostariophysi: Characiformes: Erythrinidae) with descriptions of two new species

“…Pellegrino et al (2005) proposed that the origin of rio Doce, together with the formation of current rio São Francisco, were responsible for isolating this region. The area from southern coastal Bahia to the northern portion of Espírito Santo is inhabited by many endemic taxa, and is considered a "hotspot" of biodiversity (Bizerril, 1994;Chomitz et al, 2005;Galindo-Leal & Câmara, 2005;Rocha et al, 2005). Examples of endemic fishes from that region can be found in the studies of Menezes (1988), Weitzman et al (1988) Zanata & Camelier (2009), among others.…”