Elephants or onions? Paying for nature in Amboseli, Kenya

Bulte, E., Boone, R., Stringer, R. and Thornton, P. 2008. Elephants or onions? Paying for nature in Amboseli, Kenya. Environment and Development Economics 13(3):395–414.

Traditional grazing grounds near Amboseli National Park (Kenya) are being rapidly converted to cropland – a process that closes important wildlife corridors. We use a spatially explicit simulation model that integrates ecosystem dynamics and pastoral decision-making to explore the scope for introducing a ‘payments for ecosystem services’ scheme to compensate pastoralists for spillover benefits associated with forms of land use that are compatible with wildlife conservation. Our break-even cost analysis suggests that the benefits of such a scheme likely exceed its costs for a large part of the study area, but that ‘leakage effects’ through excessive stocking rates warrant close scrutiny.