Publication: Assessing the Potential for
Payments for Watershed Services to Reduce Poverty in
Highland Guatemala
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Published
2008-07
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Date
2014-06-23
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Abstract
It has often been assumed that payments for watershed services (PWS) would go mostly to poor land users, thus contributing to poverty reduction, but there has been little empirical verification to date. This paper uses data from highland Guatemala to assess the potential for PWS to reduce poverty by examining whether the recipients of payments for environmental services are likely to be poor. The watersheds in which PWS would be feasible due to the presence of downstream water users are mapped, and compared to maps of poverty rates and densities. Poverty rates vary substantially in areas where PWS could be developed. The total number of poor that could potentially be reached if PWS mechanisms were developed in all the water supply areas is 1.76 million, or 34 percent of the country s poor (excluding Petén).
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“Pagiola, Stefano; Zhang, Wei; Colom, Ale. 2008. Assessing the Potential for
Payments for Watershed Services to Reduce Poverty in
Highland Guatemala. Payments for Environmental Services (PES)
learning paper ; no. 2008-1. © http://hdl.handle.net/10986/18720 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”
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