Environmental economics

Ecology

Additionality

Public economics

Environmental resource management

Archaeology

Grey literature

Political science

Geography

Livelihood

Finance

Business

Equity (law)

Ecosystem services

Biology

Ecosystem

Intergenerational equity

Natural resource economics

Agriculture

MEDLINE

Sustainability

Payment

Economics

Ecological Economics

Through a systematic review of peer-reviewed and grey literature, this paper analyzes evidence of the livelihood impacts of Payments for Environmental Services (PES). Forty-six studies assessed PES livelihood impacts. The assessments presented more positive livelihood impacts than negative ones, focusing on financial benefits. Non-monetary and non-material impacts of PES were largely understudied. Most reviews focused on ES providers, hindering the understanding of broader societal impacts. The review yielded examples where participants lost from their participation or where improvements in one livelihood dimension paralleled deterioration in another. Consequently, we identified key research gaps in: i) understanding the social and cultural impacts of PES, ii) evaluating environmental and economic additionality from improving other ES at the expense of cultural ones, iii) and assessing PES impacts in terms of trade-offs between multiple livelihood dimensions. Moreover, increased knowledge is needed on the imp...

The Different Dimensions of Livelihood Impacts of Payments for Environmental Services (PES) Schemes: A Systematic Review