Costa Rica's payment for environmental services
Pago por servicios ambientales de Costa Rica
- Date
- 1996-1997 · confidence high
- Place
- San José, Costa Rica
- Credited to
- Government of Costa Rica; FONAFIFO and Forest Law 7575
- Field
- Life & health
⚠️ Disputed: the sources disagree.
What it is
The 1996 Forest Law recognised the services provided by forests (carbon, water, biodiversity, scenery) and created a national programme paying landowners to conserve them and reforest. It was one of the first national schemes of this kind.
Causality between the programme and forest recovery is debated, since the abandonment of pasture, the logging ban and protected areas also contributed. The programme began paying in 1997.
What it led to
- recovery of Costa Rican forest cover (from a little over a quarter to more than half of the territory)
- a model for payment-for-ecosystem-services programmes worldwide
- financing through a fuel tax