Valuing biodiversity protection: Payment for Environmental Services schemes in Lao PDR

Abstract

The design of a Payment for Environmental Services (PES) scheme that involves setting a ‘pseudo market price’ per unit of environmental service requires the estimation of demand and supply. This paper presents the results of discrete choice experiments aimed at estimating the demand for environmental and social services generated by a wildlife protection PES scheme in two protected areas in Lao PDR. The discrete choice experiments targeted international tourists sampled at Vientiane airport and the urban Lao population sampled in Vientiane City as potential buyers of the environmental and social services provided by the PES scheme. The survey was customised to a developing country context to address diversity in respondents' literacy levels, language limitations of the interviewers, socio-cultural conventions, and limited trust in confidentiality and anonymity of the survey process. The marginal benefits of the environmental services so estimated were used to inform the development of a PES scheme.