STEWARDSHIP

ECOSYSTEM SERVICES

SURVEY STUDY University of Florida- School of Forest Resources and Conservation: F. Escobedo, D. Adams, S. Delphin, N. Timilsina, A. Abd-Elrahman, T. Stein, C. Demers, M. Kreye, A. Frank, N. Kil

University of Florida- Food and Resources Economics Department:

T. Borisova

The Nature Conservancy: T. Kroeger

Background

• Florida’s non-industrial private forests provide many ecosystem services to society; recognizing this value is important

• Florida Forest Stewardship Program (FSP) provides technical assistance to non-industrial private forest landowners

• FSP important conservation program and a key outreach mechanism

Problem • Florida currently has

approximately 2,000 forest landowners enrolled in the FSP • 14% have completed management

plans

• 437,823 FSP acres across the State of Florida • Additionally each ‘property’ has

unique forest types, management objectives, ecological conditions, etc.

• How to measure, assess ecosystem services and educate landowners and policy makers about benefits of conserving “working forests”?

Objectives

1. Identify ecosystem services of importance to both private landowners and public land managers

2. Quantify the ecosystem services of FSP lands using available data, statistical analysis and models

3. Economic valuation of 5 ecosystem services

4. Synthesize/ spatially analyze results at multiple scales

5. Develop extension education and outreach activities for decision-makers (State and County level)

Photo courtesy of J. Seiler

Learning Points

• Multi-disciplinary approach: Foresters, ecologists

economists, biometricians, human dimensions, geospatial

analysts

• What an ecosystem service is/is not depends on

who/when you ask

• Foresters difficult time with “timber” being an ecosystem

service

• InVEST model: Expensive and time consuming; better

results using primary data (FIA)

• Methods for quantifying “Tradeoffs” and identifying

influential forest structure needed

Methods Overview 1. Geospatial

• Florida Land Use, Land Cover classification System spatial data (Landsat TM- 30m)

• Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Service and Tradeoffs (InVEST) Water Purification model

2. Statistical-spatial analyses of field data

• USDA Forest Inventory and Analysis Program (FIA) timber and carbon data (43 plots on FSPs and 489 within 1 mile)

3. Benefits transfer, meta-analysis and econometric modeling

• Willingness to pay for water resource protection -forest conservation programs literature

• Valuation of avoided loss of habitat for key species

4. E-mail surveys, expert elicitations (Delphi method)

http://www.sfrc.ufl.edu/cfeor/SESS.html

Carbon Storage and Timber Volume

Carbon stocks and

timber production on

FSP properties and

adjacent lands

• Northeastern and central

Florida: Net timber volume

greater on FSP forests than

on adjacent non-FSP forests

and in northern Florida

• NFL: Average total carbon

stocks on FSP forests were

greater than in immediately

adjacent Non-FSP forests

FIA Units (Mg C/HA)

Forest

Types

North

western North

Eastern Central Southern

FSP Non-

FSP FSP

Non-

FSP FSP

Non-

FSP FSP

Non-

FSP

Longleaf

Pine NA 154 139 129 163 NA NA NA

Mixed

upland

hardwood 135 78 120 87 NA 142 NA 191

Land Manager and Public Landowner

Perceptions Survey • E-mail survey of land managers and public landowners

• Perceptions on ecosystem services

• 594, 37% response rate, 27 mostly county agencies

• Perceptions, preferences, importance differ widely

• Land managers: Recreation, aesthetics, wildlife habitat, and natural

resources conservation

• NIPF: Enjoyment of scenery, overall environmental quality for

recreation opportunities, and quality of drinking water

• Familiarity with terms such as “ecosystem services” and “carbon

storage” was highly variable

Economic Value of Water Resource

Protection and Forest Conservation

• Our econometric model predicts that the public is WTP:

• Increasingly more each year to protect water quality in unpolluted

water bodies

• More for programs that focus on protecting water resources

within their own watershed/basin

• Less for programs that reduce private landowner control of forest

lands (acquisition/easements)

• Program process may have a large

influence on WTP and on public

support for such programs

Water Quality

Economic value of water resource protection and forest

conservation

Policy Site Resource Program

Annual

Household

WTP

CI (95%) Population Total Annual

WTP

Lower

Suwannee

River

Watershed

Streams and

rivers

Acquisition/

Easement $2.29 $2.10 - $2.50 46,000 $105,340

Non-specific

program $43.79 $39.98 - $47.97 46,000 $2,014,340

Wetlands,

lakes and all

water

resources

Acquisition/

Easement $6.51 $5.95 - $7.13 46,000 $299,460

Non-specific

program $127.79 $116.65 - $139.99 46,000 $5,878,340

A benefit transfer of annual household willingness-to-pay (WTP) values (2010 US dollars) to

the lower Suwannee River watershed located in the northwest region of Florida (Median

annual household income = $35,371).

Wildlife

Economic analysis of the value

of conserving habitat for 5

threatened or endangered

wildlife species

• Benefit transfer and expert

elicitation

• Economic value of the avoided

losses in bald eagle, red-

cockaded woodpecker, Florida

black bear, gopher tortoise,

Florida scrub-jay populations

by FSP forest management

objectives ~ $54 M PV

Results • Altogether, we estimate that the typical acre of forest land

enrolled in the FSP program provides ecosystem services that have a present value of $5,030 per acre

• In relative terms, water provided the largest share of the value (66%), followed by carbon stocks (25%), timber production (7%) and wildlife (2%)

Average Present Value (2010$)

Service Description All FSP lands Per hectare Per acre

Percent

of total

Water purification Value of maintaining water

quality $1,446,357,500 $8,160 $3,300 66%

Carbon stocks Value of carbon stocks,

($19 per MgC) $558,827,870 $3,150 $1,280 25%

Timber Value of timber using the

InVEST model $10,100,545 $825 $330 7%

Wildlife

(Non-use value)

Value of preventing up to

5% loss in populations of 5

charismatic species $54,112,000 $305 $120 2%

Total $2,069,398,000 $12,440 $5,030 100%

Extension Education and Outreach

Foresters - Earn 2 Cat. 1 CFEs:

Forest Stewardship Polycom Workshop: The “Green Value” of Your Woods December 12, 2012 1:00 – 4:00 PM ET (12:00 – 3:00 PM CT)

Broadcast to UF-IFAS

Extension facilities

across Florida. Select

your location when

registering.

http://www.sfrc.ufl.edu/cfeor/SESS.html

Education and Research

• Student training

• 1 Post-Dec, 3 PhD, 2 MS, 3 undergraduate

• Peer-Reviewed Publications

• Timilsina, N., et al. (2012). A framework for identifying carbon

hotspots and forest management drivers. Journal of Environmental

Management, doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2012.10.020 .

• Delphin, S. et al. (Submitted). Assessing and mapping potential

losses of ecosystem services from hurricanes: Implications for

timber and carbon storage.

• Kreye M. et al. (Submitted). The Value of Forest Conservation for

Water Quality Protection.

• Timilsina N. et al. (Submitted). Predicting understory species

richness from available forest inventories using regression trees.

http://www.sfrc.ufl.edu/cfeor/SESS.html

Acknowledgements

• Florida Forest Service (FFS) SESS contract # 015816,

and UF-SFRC for funding

• Funding for this publication and associated research is provided in

part by the USDA Forest Service. This institution is an equal

opportunity employer.

• FFS: Charlie Marcus, Steve Jennings, Tony Grossman, M.

Humphrey

• UF: Tim White, Chris Demers, Zoltan Szantoi

• USDA Forest Service: Sam Lambert and Tom Brandeis

http://www.sfrc.ufl.edu/cfeor/SESS.html