Payments for ecosystem services and food security

A healthy ecosystem can provide a variety of crucial services for public goods, such as clean water, nutrient cycling, climate regulation and food security services that contribute directly or indirectly to human well-being. Yet today, many ecosystems are in decline; this is of particular importance to agriculture, which depends on ecosystem services. Loss of healthy ecosystems will seriously affect the production of food, both today and in the future. Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES) is an economic instrument designed to provide positive incentives to users of agricultural land and those involved in coastal or marine management. These incentives are expected to result in continued or improved provision of ecosystem services, which, in turn, will benefit society as a whole.